The Nonhuman in American Literary Naturalism offers a new perspective on American literary naturalism that considers those under-researched aspects of the genre that can be gathered under the term the Nonhuman. The contributors, an international team of scholars, have turned their attention to that which becomes visible when the human subject is skirted, or perhaps, temporarily at least, moved off-center: in other words, the representation of nonhuman animals and other vital or inert species, things, entities, cityscapes and seascapes, that also appear and play an important part in American literary naturalism. Informed by animal studies, ecocriticism, posthumanism, new materialism, and other recent theoretical and philosophical perspectives, the essays in this collection discuss early naturalist texts by Norris, Crane, Dreiser, London, Wharton and Cather, as well as more recent followers in the tradition of American literary naturalism: Hemingway, Agee & Evans, Petry, Hamilton, Dick, Vonnegut, Tepper, and DeLillo. The collection responds to a need to expand and refine the connections among nonhuman studies and texts associated with American literary naturalism and to productively expand the scholarly discourse surrounding this vital movement in American literary history.

The Midwest has produced a robust literary heritage. Its authors have won half of the nation's Nobel Prizes for Literature plus a significant number of Pulitzer Prizes. This volume explores the rich racial, ethnic, and cultural diversity of the region. It also contains entries on 35 pivotal Midwestern literary works, literary genres, literary, cultural, historical, and social movements, state and city literatures, literary journals and magazines, as well as entries on science fiction, film, comic strips, graphic novels, and environmental writing. Prepared by a team of scholars, this second volume of the Dictionary of Midwestern Literature is a comprehensive resource that demonstrates the Midwest's continuing cultural vitality and the stature and distinctiveness of its literature.