Overview
Crime and the Nation explores the correlation between fiction writing and national identity in the late eighteenth century when these two enterprises went hand in hand. The 1780s and '90s witnessed a spirited public debate on crime and punishment that produced a new kind of fiction and a new kind of prison. The world's first penitentiary-style prison opened at Philadelphia in 1790. At the same time jurists, reformers and fiction writers found new uses for the criminal. Suddenly, he was fascinating, he was edifying to the community, he was worth displaying and reforming. In a young nation whose very origins were perceived as criminal, yet clearly necessary and ultimately redeemable, crime emerged as an essential-and controversial-component of national identity. Crime and the Nation explores the nature of that identity, and the origins of America's unique and enduring love affair with crime and crime fiction.
Full Product Details
Author: Peter Okun
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd
Imprint: Routledge
Dimensions:
Width: 15.20cm
, Height: 1.30cm
, Length: 22.90cm
Weight: 0.272kg
ISBN: 9781138880115
ISBN 10: 1138880116
Pages: 208
Publication Date: 19 August 2015
Audience:
College/higher education
,
Professional and scholarly
,
Undergraduate
,
Postgraduate, Research & Scholarly
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active
Availability: In Print
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Reviews
The essays, many by reputable writers cover the lack of legal counsel, the paucity of healthcare, the racial overtones, the plight of women prisoners, the impact of the war on drugs, and the numerous other related subjects. -- Library Journal This is an analysis of the representations and discourses about crime and imprisonment in a small number of prison reform tracts and novels about crime and punishment, mostly from Philadelphia. -- Allen Steinberg, University of Iowa For those interested in the intersections found in popular fiction and penal reform, a provocative new direction has been plotted. -- The Pennsylvania Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography
""The essays, many by reputable writers cover the lack of legal counsel, the paucity of healthcare, the racial overtones, the plight of women prisoners, the impact of the war on drugs, and the numerous other related subjects."" -- Library Journal ""This is an analysis of the representations and discourses about crime and imprisonment in a small number of prison reform tracts and novels about crime and punishment, mostly from Philadelphia."" -- Allen Steinberg, University of Iowa ""For those interested in the intersections found in popular fiction and penal reform, a provocative new direction has been plotted."" -- The Pennsylvania Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography
Author Information
Specializing in Literary History and the Early Modern Period, Peter T.M. Okun, holds a Ph.D. in Literature and teaches at Davis and Elkins College in West Virginia. Dr. Okun's research interests include interdisciplinary approaches to literature, and range from prison reform and popular culture to psychology, law and literature.
