The Haunt of Home : : A Journey through America's Heartland / / Zachary Michael Jack.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter Cornell University Press Complete eBook-Package 2020
• VerfasserIn: Jack, Zachary Michael,
• Place / Publishing House: Ithaca, NY : : Cornell University Press, , [2020]; ©2022
• Year of Publication: 2020
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (216 p.) :; 1 b&w halftone

What does it mean to deeply love a home place that haunts us still? From Mark Twain to Grant Wood to Garrison Keillor, regionalists from the Gilded Age to the Digital Age have explored the American Gothic and the homegrown fatalism that flourishes in many of the nation's most far-flung and forgotten places. The Haunt of Home introduces us to a cast of real-life midwestern characters grappling with the Gothic in their own lives, from promising young professionals debating the perennial "should I stay or should I go now" dilemma, to recent emigres and entrepreneurs seeking personal reinvention, to faithful boosters determined to keep their communities alive despite the odds. In The Haunt of Home Zachary Michael Jack considers the many ways a region's abiding spirit shapes the ethos of a land and its people, offering portraits of others who, like himself, are determined to live out the unique promise and predicament of the Gothic.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Introduction: Middle American Gothic and the Haunt of Home -- Part I: Legacies -- 1. Life in Sunnier Climes -- 2. Playing Ball for the Team of the Dead -- 3. Springtime on the Prairie: A Middle American Gothic -- Part II: Visitations -- 4. The Promise of New Blood -- 5. Pitchforks and Pies -- 6. The Casket-maker’s Son -- 7. Death by Mail -- 8. Life and Death in Oz -- 9. Exhuming the Regionalist Body -- 10. Dredge: A Middle American Gothic -- Part III: Resurrections -- 11. Ghost Players -- 12. Cornfield Cathedrals -- 13. Dovesong: A Middle American Dirge -- Afterword: Life after Death -- Acknowledgments