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I
BIOGRAPHICAL BACKGROUNDS

 

.Hamlin Garland, the prairie novelist, is a decen-

.j' dent of the earliest American tradition. His ances-.

’ tors, of scotch and Hnglish extraction, arrived in
lmssachusettes Bay from Sussex in 1627. For two cen-
turies his forbears settled in New England and it was
not until 1830 that his father, Richard Garland, and
his grandparents migrated to Green County, Wisconsin.
Richard Garland married Isabelle IcClintock, the
daughter of a neighboring pioneer family and together
they established a modest farm near Onalaska, Wiscon-

- sin. Here in 1860 Hamlin Garland was born.1

Garland, one of four children, was born in a
bleak environment at best. His parents had only a

' rudimentary education and few possessions. His hone
was a simple, rude cabin. A bleak prairie, almost
devoid of neighbors, was his environment. His earli-

,. est recollections were those of poverty and conflict, .

2,? of the bitterness of the Civil War and of the endless é

— . struggle to wrest a living from the soil.

Garland's first education was provided in a neighd

boring farm house under the supervision of a former

6'
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l. Biographical date for this chapter was taken chiefly
from Hamlin Garland's autobiographical works-5 I:-
éus -. 9 _hed. Agra- , The I:L: er of :1 ',ga-e
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teacher who taught him to read. it seven, he attended

‘the public school in Onalasha. Impressed by litera-

ture even as a child, he eagerly read the few mater-
ials his surroundings offered, the fiiblg, Eggggzlg,
‘ggugl and flagpegis figgglz. Through chuffey a Reader,
he became acquainted with Scott, Byron, Southey, lords?
worth and Masters. His grandmother Garland, a bookish
Boston import, taught him the poems of Whittier and
Longfellow and the proverbs of the Puritans.

In February of 1369, Garland's father sold the

Cooley farm and the family moved to Hesper, linnesota.

Here his youngest sister Jessie was born. Their settle-.
ment in Iinnesota was short-lived, however, for'Hich;
ard Garland, a restless pioneer whowas always in search:
of new land, seized an opportunity to sell the property
and again moved his family, this time to the bleak
prairie of litchell County, near Osage, Iowa. Here
young Garland learned what it truly was to pioneer.
There was a house to build and a farm to establish, and
at eleven, he was already behind the plow breaking new
ground for cultivation.

Garland's education in Osage was intermittent. His
services were needed on the farm and he attended school
only when the weather made farm work impossible. He

still found time to read however, and became acquainted

with the dime novel, the 33w Xgrg 133311, the New log;

 

  

 

 

M.WW.

WWW It
was here too that Garland discovered his firht impor-
tant chronicle of everyday life in a newspaper called

the fie;;th_agg_flgge where he read a serialized edition

of Edward ngleston's pioneer study, IDI.HQ£!L££.§£ER£§?

gggtgr. He was deeply impressed to discover that a
novel could be developed out of a background of fanning
and familiar scenes. Garland later said of the work,
”The book is a milestone in my literary progress as
it was in the development of lestern fiction.1

In larch of 1876, the Garland family moved again.
Richard Garland had Joined the Grange, a farm coopera-
tive, and he moved into the town of Osage where he had
been offered employment as the official grain buyer for
the Grange. During the summer, Garland worked with his

father in the granary and in the fall entered the Osage

' Seminary. Ihen his parents moved back to the farm.the
following year, Garland remained in Osage attending the
Seminary.
At the Seminary, Garland developed an early inter-
est in artistic endeavor. Be first turned his atten- .
tion to drama and became a member of the Adelphian .
. Society, but his attempts at dramatic production were

unsuccessful. He then devoted himself to oratory and

' 1. Garland, fign g; the giddlg figgggg, 115.

A

did succood in establishing a nodast reputation in
tho school. His snthusiasn'for literature datpanod
pas he became acquaintod with Hawthorn: and particup
llarly Honolla, whost novel, Ing_flggiggg:§gzg_gggn§;z,
profoundly affactod bin. .

In 1880, Garland graduated from tho.Oaa¢a'80linary.»
His parents had novnd to Ordnay, South Dakota and Ear-
land, unwilling to acconpony than, travsllod inatacd
into Iinnoaota, looking for a toaching position. Ec.'.
was unsuccassrul howovsr, and baing destituto, ha .
acceptod temporary smploynsnt,.cs a construction workar,
as an office copy boy, and oven as a aingar in a
!.I.C.A. band. 89 than want to Grundy County, Ohio,
Ihoro ho taught in a country school, later scouring a
poaition as an instructor in a small normal collcgc in
lorriac. Eagar to so. the country, by travellod during
his fro. tint nith his brother to Boston, low York,
Itchington and Chicago.

In 1883, he roturned to his parantc' hone in 0rd-
nay to work in a small store which his rathor had octah-
1iahod. But he was much more intarostod in teaching
than in businoaa, and ha spont.his tins reading faint,

Chtlbar's Iaszsl2n2di2_2£_£nxli2h_hiizzciuzi.Ind 6r0on"t-
Iiai2zz.2£.ih1_§nali§h_£22212 in In affort to discovtr

the lava which govern litorcry devoloplant and to loarn .
tho Inthods of calf oxprossion. .
if’ It was at this time that tho expansion of tha Dakotas

 

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7- ' . ‘

was underway. Garland decided to take advantage of
the government's offer of free land and established '
a clain of his cvn in IcPherson.County. His intention
,eas to acquire the lend, remain on it long enough to
develop it and establish ownership, and then to sell‘
it, but one dry and scorching summer and a severely
001d winter destroyed his taste for pioneering. ‘At .
the suggestion of Ir. Bradford, a Portland ninister,
he mortgaged his claim and went to Boston to continue
his education. he was dissatisfied with the Boston
University offerings, however, and confined his studies
to the Boston Public Library, where he read Spencer,
herein, Fiske, Belaholts, Haeckel, whit-an and others.
since he ens not s resident and without means, Garland
its unable to withdraw books and-had to do.a1l of his
reading in the library until through the courtesy of
Dr. Edward Everett Bale, he vas able to secure a lib-
rary card.

Oarlsndls finances were at a lov ebb when he let'.
Dr. Cross, a kindly Bostonian who took an interest in
hm! and offered his acconodations in his home. _This
arrangenent permitted Garland to remain in Boston where
he spent what little money he had on lectures, concerts
and every other educational offering within his reach
in a feverish desire to acquire learning. He.eas eeo

pedially attracted to the performances of Edwin Booth,

 

the noted Shakespearian actor. Garland attended his . Q
every performance and, as a study, he composed several
orations on Booth's acting techniques and his interpre-
tation of Shakespeare.

it the close of a free lecture in the Boston Pub-.-
lic Library, Garland arose and congratulated the speaker,
loses Browne, who was a professor of oratory in a school
which he directed. The professor vas impressed with~
Garland and there began an association which was duper; '
tent in the shaping of Garland's career. The.professor
arranged for Garland to teach oratory at his school,‘ , 1
The loses True Broane School of Oratory, and also'in-

u' - ,
-uLk-g. .al

eluded a program of Garland'a lectures on Booth. One:..
of the students in Garland's classes, a Ira. Payne of,
Hyde Park, recognized Garland as a lecturer of promise
and used her influence to sponsor him in a private lec-
ture series. it the first of these lectures, Garland
net charles B. Hurd, literary editor of the Izgngggfilg,
"tho urged him to write for publication. Through Sued,
[several of Garland's critical studies appeared in the "

Zlfiflfifiliflle
. . Incouraged by his first appearance in print, Gar-
." ,. had attempted his first creative piece, W,

W, a grim and revealing story of western
lifes~ Be sent the manuscript to William Wycoff, editor_

 

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6f the gag Agerican;gggasing, who received it enthus-

iistically. Garland then wrote a series of shdrt stories
depicting various seasons on the farm, which Wycoff
also published.

It was at this time that Garland received a copy.
'of 1922, from hard who asked him to read the novel and
to write a review for the Izgngggint. Garland was'
deeply impressed and wrote a highly flattering account
which Hurd published. Kirkland, the author of figgx,
was greatly pleased by the article and he wrote Gare
land asking him to visit in Chicago. '

This meeting with Kirkland was instruaental in
directing Garland into his main-stream of creative work.
Kirkland, who had ’read some of Garland's western sketches,
urged him to write fiction.e Garland explained that he-
hesitated to'try fiction because he felt weak in the i
use of the conversational medium. Kirkland encouraged
him to try, advised him to write realistically of the'
middle border area which he knew best, and asked hi. to
fulfill his obvious promise.

Garland returned to his former home with a new per-
spective. His.trip to Boston had brought into sharp
focus the appalling contrast between Eastern and West-
ern living. Bis reading of the econondc philosophies
'ofVEenry George, Karl larx, and William lorris had in-'

flamed him with the unnecessary injustice of it all.

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The words of Kirkland ran; in his ears and he began

to see hiaself as the interpreter of his prairie people,
the voice of their suffering. Bitterly, Garland noted
the details of their poverty, their sordid struszle and
half—hidden despair, vith rebellion and rage. In the

flog of the giddle Border, he reported,

“Instructed in the new philosophy, I now
perceived that these plow-en, these wives
and daughters had been pushed out into
these lonely, ugly shacks by the forcea
of landlordisn behind. These plodding
Swedes and Danes, these thrift Ger-ans,
these hairy Russians had all f ed from
the feudalisn of their native lands and
were here because they had no share in
the soil from which they sprung, and be-

. cause in the settled communities of the
eastern states, the speculative deland
for land had hindered then from acquir-
ing even a leasing right to the surface
of the earth"l

Garland sorked in the fields that summer intending
to return to Boston in the fall. Every detail of his
daily life on the farm noe assumed a literary signifi-
cance. He noted all the discomfort: of physical labor
and its unpleasant results but 'vith no intention of
'exalting toil into a wholesome and regenerative thing
as Tolstoi, an aristocrat, had attempted to do ...
but as warfare“.2 Through it all, Garland vrote
feverishly and with bitter conviction. From a con-
versation with his mother, Garland developed the these

1. Garland fign 9f the giddle figgdeg, 267-68.
bid, 351.

A

 

 

‘ .
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-I.‘

for his first story, a tale of an old pioneer woaan
who node a trip back to her law York hone after an
absence of nearly thirty years. Garland sent the an»
finished nanuscript to Kirkland who commented, 'Ibn
are the first actual farmer in American fiction «-
ncw tell the truth about it.‘ 1

In the fall of 1887, Garland returned to Boston
with the manuscript and other sketches he had ariti a.
He presented then successively to flggpggg and the
gumggzz,and other leading nagazines of the tine, but
they were all rejected. The editors considered the-
stcries too brutal and suggested that he write less
frankly. it this point, however, Garland refused to
coaproaise.

During his second visit to Boston, Garland attended
a lecture delivered by Henry George in Fanneil Hall; ‘
George was attracting considerable attention as an
economic reformer who offered a program of land and
tax reforms as a solution to poverty. Garland had
been attracted to George by an earlier reading of his
2:93:33g_ggg‘2211;51,-which outlined the basis of the
Georgist theory. Garland had found there a solution
and a progran of action for the problems with which.
he was immediately concerned. After the lecture, Gare

land arranged a nesting with George and the friendship -

1 Garland, §gg o; the gigdlg figrder, 371.

‘

 

' "— " ‘ " "—"" —l——' 7"" *— qu—WFWfWTFFr-‘h-vfi
‘ I

 
  

which followed greatly influenced Garland's career as ,
a reforaer. During the next ten years, Garland was
to becone proninent as an agrarian reformer and a de-
votes of the single Tax Plan.

' Shortly after his nesting with George, Garland -
Joined the Anti-Poverty Brigade, a group of noisy and;
persistant political radicals who were agitating for '

 

economic reform. Be volunteered to speak at an organp .
ization meeting and his Sunday address which Garland
._ later described as a “heretical harangue' was reviewed
‘?‘_. in the Izggggg;2_. The protest was iaaediate. Over-
night, Garland had reached the line-light of conserva~..

'* tive Boston's disapproval and had won the recognition
of the forces of reform. He soon hecaae known'as a
lecturer and political radical. I

Garland's chief ambition was to become a writer,
however, and his desire was given additional iapetus~s'
when he read Howells' book, :hg_ligig§1;1§‘§hgggg, and.
he wrote a glowing review of it for the Irapgggigt.
A nesting was arranged with Howells, who at this tine
' was clearly the most discussed literary personality
in Boston. He was in the full tide of his powers and
his challenging social criticisms were widely debated.
His books were being read aloud in reading clubs for
the enjoyaent of his delicate humor and graceful yet
incisive style. The critics praised his characteri-

 

‘

 
  
 

rations. Garland fairly idolized Howells, avidly.

followed his lectures, read his books, and seized.

every opportunity to visit the man and to discuss
his.literary and social views. Howells. success

. deeply impressed Garland, and was the greatest single

Hr. influence upon Garland's determination to beoone a .
writer.

T~ fhrough Clements, editor of the ra scri , Gar~_

. land also became acquainted with James fierne, the
popular playwright. Garland was delighted with the
honey American quality of Herne's dramatic pieces,

': and they struck up a friendship which lasted through-

? out Kerne's lifetime.

(i. 'In the summer of 1889, Garland returned to his
former hone in the Dakotas. He was appalled byithe
deterioration of the homestead area. Two seasons of
drought had reduced the promising farms to desolation.

The wheat crops were alarmingly light in the face of

a falling market price. Everywhere there was discon-

tent and nisery, and out of the cannon dissention

there rumbled nurture of rebellion against God and
govern-ant. Moreover, Garland was affected strongly~'
in.a personal sense. His family fortunes were at '
their lowest ebb; his father was near bankruptcy and
his anther had suffered a stroke induced by years of
hard farm labor. It was this second visit to the
‘west which completely confirmed Garland in his convic-

‘

 

 

tions on tha need for raforn. He began to writ! with
bitter rssontnsnt and a vigorous intantion to t611.th0
truth about th! plight of the Wastorn {armor iho was
an innocant victil of both an and tho Iuthtr- and tho
innocsnt porn of grcsd and ignoranco.
- In this spirit, ha finished A_§zgizig_§gzgjng, o
study of a crisis in the life of s dcspoiring fornar's
Ciro which prsssntad a trsgic and hcpalcss cannon OI...
intro that the story was too grim snd robsiiioun for
the dignifisd Century, Garland cont tho nonnscript to
the Aging, a new Boston review those spirit was frankly
radical. ‘
The story was innsdistsiy cccsptod and curiand was
nhnscd to find a note from the editor, 3.0. Flavor,
saying that tho A3333 welcomed the axprossion of strong
opinions and urging Gsrland to submit more of the $CI9
frank material. This endorsement by Flower was nnothcr.
significant episods in Garland's career. Piowsr, thongh
a younr man, was attracting considsrable attsntion I!
s crusading editor. Ha devoted his nagazina to ccntro~
varsial material and dadicatad himself to social pro-
grass as a champion of reform. Garland became a rog-
‘nlar contributor to the 8:193 which Pab11$h9dg 15 _~ .
oddition to a nunbsr of his assays, his play, nadir.

3g3.gg31;, and 1h; Qsciaration of flights. It was

2‘

 

 

 

Flower who suggested that Garland collect and publish
his short stories which Garland later issued under the

titl' 0‘ Idlflhllhzsllié_fiesgan

Igig_1£§zzllgg_ngggg remains as Garland's lost
powerful and pointed social protest, the full outburst

of the indignation which Garland experienced upon his
return to the West from Boston. It is significant to
note also that this work was produced during a time of
great personal sorrow; his young sister Jessie had died
suddenly, his mother was hopelessly crippled and his
father was aged and near bankruptcy.

"All this", says Garland, "will explain why

the dedication was hitter with revolt. It
will explain also why the comfortable, the

ct. c-vative, those who farmed the farmer,
resentid my thin gray volume of acrid accusa-
ticnfi.

The protest was instant and astonishing to Garland
who believed that literary people of the lest would take
a local pride in the color and truth of his work. Ins
stead, he found hinself execrated by critics as a bird
willing to foul his own nest. Editorials poured into
his office to prove that his pictures of the border
were false, statistics were provided to show that pianos
and Brussells carpets adorned almost every Iowa far-p

house, and tilling the soil was declared by numerous

1. Garland, figs 9: the giddlg nggggg, £15.

 

5137

   

correspondents to be the noblest vocation in the world.
. Garland was called a rabblearouser, an anarchist, and
a prophet of hate.

In spite of the general outcry, Garland neverthe-
less received encouragement from a few of the writers
who adaired him. Whit-an hailed him as the literary
pioneer of the West, and Howells, while praising him,
left him a word of warning, advising him to exemplify
and not to preach, not to allow his stories to degen-
erate into tracts. Similar advice came from Richard
Iatson Gilder, who urged him not to leave Beauty cut
of the picture.

"In the light of this friendly council",
said Garland, "1 perceived my danger,
and set about to avoid the fault c nix-
ing ay fiction with my polemics'.
The protest and the "friendly council" of his exem-
plars brought about a division between Garland the
reformer and Garland the artist.

Garland had concrete evidence of the practicality
of the dichotomy when he submitted a manuscript,,‘
fipzigg_flgggggg,to Gilder, editor of the Qggtngz, The
story, deliberately stripped of controversy and grim
realities, won Gilder's approval and a substantial.

fee for Garland. Plattered by Gilder's recognition

1. Garland, So h dd e d , 417

 

A

 

 

 

15

and awakened to the financial possibilities of his
less controversial material, Garland, by 1895, def.
initely decided to separate his social protest and
his literary endeavor. He freely acknowledged where
the emphasis would be placed, however, by adnitting
that his ”reform notions were subordinate to the de-
sire to take honors as a novelist'. 1

It is significant that Garland found financial‘
advantage in his dual role as reformer and nan of
letters. Supplied by Flower with campaign funds and
a-publication outlet for his reform literature and
granted an even more lucrative outlet by Gilder for y
his literary endeavors, Garland achieved a measure
of security to the extent that he was able to recog-
' nise his earnest ambition to rescue his parents frcl"
_ their pioneer isolation and relocate then on the fam-
ily homestead at the place of his birth. For himself,
Garland established a headquarters in Chicago, confi-
dent that the uidwestern metropolis would one day be
the center of a truly American art.

Chicago in 1893 was a large, sprawling city which
was much more industrial than cultural in its outlook
and appirations. Scattered throughout the population

however, were a small number of young aesthetes,

1. Garland, go; of the lidgle 52:59:: 412.

 

 

 

artists, writers, and sculptors who were struggling

for rscognition. But in those days, as Garland phrased
it, 'Art was young and timid in Cook County“.1 Thar.
was almost no cultural organization, and Garland,

partly because he recognisad the mutual stiaulation

and inspiration which artists could give such other

and partly because he simply snjoyadibsing surroundad
by artistic parsonalitiss, assumed a certain loader-
ahip in establishing clubs and in attracting satabliahad
and promising vritars and artists as members.

A lactura callad Lgpggggiggigl_igd§;§_thiah Garland
dalivarad in Chicago and in which be vigorously ans
dorsad tho so called "law Art' and “The Opan Air School
of Painting" won for him the instant attention of tha
artistic circla in gensral and of Lorsdo Taft in parti-
cular. Taft was ths fora-oat Chicago sculptor of tho
tins and a rscognizad leader in artistic thought.
through Taft, Garland joined tha 'Bunnias', an associ-
ation which included Bessie Potter, ldward Relay, 011-
var Grover, Charles Brown, Harman lacusill and othsr
young artists of proaiso. The group not informally in
Taft's studios and prascntad a united front against
criticisms of thair art. as also bacass a naabar of
tho "Little Room" club, ahich included lost of tha
”Bunnies” and a nunbar of writers such as tugana Fisld,

1. Garland, Qagghtsr of ths fligdlg figrdgz, A

 

16'

A

  

 

 

-17

Opie Read, Ralph Clarkson, George Ade and Henry Fuller.

Garland's club activities expanded beyond these
modest beginnings. He helped to establish the "Cliff
Dwellers", which he saw as a rallying point for lid-
land artists and writers and he was instrumental in
getting the site and funds for the Century Club in
the Huntington Library. in ardent and active club
man, Garland was convinced that associations such as
these would one day make Chicago an important cultural
center.

Chicago in a very real sense became the scene of}
Garland's struggle with his own art.- Soon after his
arrival he wrote and published Q;gg§l19g_xgglg which-
he intended as a manifesto of the new art. -Aa ardent
plea for a native American literature, based on unique-‘
1y Auericsn ideals and philosophies, he hoped in the
.book to establish himself as an art critic. From chi-
cage he travelled widely to the South and West in
search of new material to authenticate the bacigrpnnds.
for a whole series of romantic novels which he prc- ‘
duced during the period. He avidly courted the attané
tion of American and European artists, eager to be re-
ceived by them and to be stimulated by their encourage~
ment. He could be counted upon to champion any cause

of proaise and to grace and significant aesthetic

gathering.

 

 

 

ll

Ihile in Chicago, Garland married Zumile Taft,

the sister of Loredo Taft, the sculptor, and the daugh-
ter of a prominent family. They had-two daughters,
Constance and Isabella. . .

By 1915, Garland’s dream of Chicago's turns. had -
faded and he returned to New York, convinced that Chi-
cago would never reach his earlier expectations and
satisfied that his future lay in the more secure
Castern environment of established literary tradition
and in closer proximity to his publishers. .

. Upon his return to New York, Garland began his
autobiographical period, producing a series of novels
which narrated the family history. The works were
well received and the first of these in particular..--
W is still acclaimed a‘a
Garland's greatest literary accomplishment.

By slow degrees, Garland was realizing his ambl-
tions.' Though he never became wealthy, Garland did
achieve security and more important, won the literary
recognition he so passionately sought. In 1918, he
was elected to the American Academy, which was to
Garland a hallowed circle. In 1921, he was given the
Pulitzer Prize in biography and in 1922 was awarded an
honorary doctor's degree from the University of His-
consin. His improved financial condition permitted

him to maintain summer residence in London and a

 

   

 

 

lountain retreat in the Catskills. He was received by,‘

if not intimate with, the privileged classes which he

. once reviled but had now come to admire.

By 1930, Garland, comfortable and established. ‘
turned his efforts to reminiscences and criticism, and
in the next ten years produced a series of reminiscent
excursions on.his literary activities and critical.
evaluations of his associates. the volumes are dreary
and discursive, lacking in vitality and far too perg
canal to be of general interest, enlightened only by
the.intimate glimpses and anecdotes of the many great
personalities who left deep impressions on the era and

- on Garland himself.

Garland, the occasional realist and litery opporp
tunist, died in 19in, a novelist of reputation and for

a time, at least, a significant voice in American reg

fora.

 

 

—.'v-_Jc. 111*" .u.

-
hi“: v

 

 

20

II
SOCIAL THEORY

i°It was inevitable from the beginning that Garland
would be attracted to social reform. The first twenty
years of his life were spent in the rural liddle lest
Lduring troubled, turbulent times.1 Immediately pre-
r'ceding'his birth was the colorful era of Western~er-
pension, not the thrilling or picturesdue exploits of
the adventurer but the determined.and equally heroic
struggle of the frontier farmer to make a permanent
. home upon the land. Theirs was not the spectacular
lure of gold but the call of fertile land which offered
a home and security in return for hard work.

The pioneer did not travel Westward alone. Vith
'hll went the land speculator, the money lenders, and
‘the business interests which bought, traded and rented
at.a profit. After fifty years of effort, the prairie
farmer was far from the security for whidh he had la-
bored. His rented, unimproved land was depleting, his
obligations were increasing, and he was caught in a '
cycle of brutal toil-and-poverty. And, he was but one
of the economic victims of the times -—-Across the en-

tire country there swelled a chorus of protest of the

1. See John D. Hicks, 1h3_£%2§;ig31§§¥glii Minneapolis,
University of Iinnesota ress, so, Oscar

Carxill, zhe ggcial 31v glt, New YOrk, lacmillan, 1933.

A

 

 

 

ilpoverished, victinn of unbridled capitalism and
- greed.

The decade of the eighties witnessed the rise of
the reform champions: Henry Aden: and hie'denunciey
tion of political corruption and machine power} Theo- '
dore Roosevelt, the standard bearer of civic retorn;
Henry George, the economic theorist and epokeanan tor
the‘inpoverinhed; Edward Bellamy, the Utopian Relen-
cer; lillien lowells, the Christian Socialist; Ines
Baird Weaver, the clarion of.the Populiete; williel.
Jennings”!!! "Coin” Hervey; Generel Corey: lane»
tine Donnelley; Jenn Altgeld; and a host of othere.
The decade sew the rise of the Grange, the Pernere
Alliance, and the organized ection of farm cooper.-
tivee. The discouragement of ell the oppressed wle
finding collective expression in e untionel unity,

As tanpcent corn and ten percent interest tronbled
Kansas, so sixvcent cotton inflamed Georgie, end both
were frankly sympathetic with lontane and Colorado
liners who suffered from a drop in the price of silver.
to express the meaning of this revolt, e number of
.redical oretors were commistioned and in the field.
Iery Ellen Lease and “Bookless Jerry" Simpson voiced.
the demands of the Pleinenen, while 'Coin' Harvey
stirred the “Silver Bugs" of the 90's almost to e

A

21'

 

 

"as ‘

frensy. It was an era'of fervent neetings and fulline
;atinfi resolutions. the Grange had been social or at
most connercially cooperative in its activities, but
the Farcers Alliance cane as_a revolt. One and all,
the victims found haven in the People's Party which
was challenging the oldoline politicaleconservatives.

. Hanlin Garland, 11k9efib?“2¥h’r'v looked for rea-
sons to explain the poverty anddeprivatinn 9f the
people fro: whom he cane. Beared as he was in port
'erty, gifted with sensitivity and intelligence, he was
determined to voice the injustices of the border world.
As a child, his keen observation quickly noted the coup_
parison anon3.the tenant farner, the landowner, and
the city dweller. His youthful eyes noted the rough f
garb, the knarled hands, the wearisone stoop of the
tenant as opposed to the grace, chars and sophistica-
tion of his more fortunate neighbors. is a youth,
he knew the despair of crop failure, blight, and .
drought, which were frequently the reward of endless
labor. Be witnessed the constant nigration of farners
4who, leaving the land on which they had toiled in vain,
sent in search of more fertile land or a honestead
free from the exorbitant rents of the landowner. He
saw his childhood friends pressed into early service
behind the plow, denied the advantages of education”
"beyond the earliest primers which served only to Stilr
ulate an appetite vhich would never be fulfilled.

I
‘ \
. O
‘I
a.
e e
U
a
e
e .
. e ‘s‘
--

 

 

lost of all, his sensitive nature rebelled against the
drudgery of women whose endless labor made then old
before their tine.
"Is it not time that the human hand ceased
to be primarily a bludgeon for hammering
a bare livigi out of the earth? nature,
all bounti , undiscrininating, would uh.
der Justice, make such a toil unnecessary.
ly heart burned with indignation. With
William Harris and Henry George I exclaimed,
'lature is nit to blaae... Ian's laws are
to blane'".

Sager for Justice, Garland thought that he had
found a solution in the economic credo of Henry George.
Garland became acquainted with George in Boston.
George had been attracting widespread attention among
agrarian groups for his economic philosophy, the cen-
tral theaes of which were agingle tax plan and the
abolition of trade barriers. George advised the
collection of economic rent by the government based
- on the strict assessed valuation of land, exempting
all buildings or improve-eats of any sort. Be be-
lieved that the plan would bring all idle lands into
use and would-discourage the large holdings of unused
'lands by banks and corporations since no one could
afford to keep strictly taxed land out of production.

He believed further that the revenue from such a plan

 
  

1. Garland, ‘ 1 e ;-,- r, 363.
2. See Henry Geor e, r u -_ . ' lew york,
Doubleday, 192 3 A so .e. Stee e, our Credo",
We. VI (nay £943) 3.

          

In}. ‘

23

 

 

would be sufficient for all legitimate operations of '
government and that no other taxes would be necessary.
The abolition of trade barriers would free men to ex-
ercise their natural instincts to trade which would
enrich and raise the standard or living or .11 the
peoples of the world. George, who began his canpaign
in California, carried the idea eastward to Iew York
City where he unsuccessfully became a candidate for
mayor. Believing in the international aspects of his
plan, he brought his ideas to England and to Ireland,
where he was twice imprisoned. .Bis £ggg;1;1_ggg_zgz-
3:51, a manifesto of his economic views, published in
1879, attracted much attention.

In 1893, Garland attended a George lecture in
Panueil Ball in Boston which inspired him to read grog

g;ggg_ggg_zgzggtz. Here, Garland found the progran.he

had been seeking. In comment on the work, Garland said,

"Unrestricted individual ownership of the
earth, I acknowledged to be wrong and I
caught some glimpse of the radiant plenty
of George's Ideal Commonwealth. The trun-
pet cal of the closing pages filled me
with a desire to battle for the right.
Here was a theme for the great orator.
Here was opportunity for the most devoted
evangel“.

For almost a decade Garland travelled in the Geor-
giat camp.. In 1886, he Joined the Anti-Poverty Brigade

“and closely followed George as a speaker. 813 writings

1. Garland, Son f t iddle rder, 313.

.A

 

 

and lectures made him prominent as an agrarian radical
and devotee of the single tax plan. He Joined the
Populists, who, representing the farmers in the test,
were the first great social realists of the new era;
the first to speak openly and bravely of the dangers
of plutocracy, the first to convey something of the
bewildernent and anguish a whole generation felt in
the disillisionlent that followed the Civil Iar.
Populism, being essentially a ground swell of protest,
was the first to influence a folk literature based on
connon needs and a cannon struggle. Garland offered
his services to the Populist State Central Coulittee
of Iowa and actively campaigned in the interests of
the third party. He spoke at picnic gounds, livery
stables and conventions, his indignation growing,
sharper at every stop. Along with other eager young :'
reformers such as the sharp-tongued Iary Ellen Lease '
(fa-ous for her admonition to Kansas farmers to "raise
less corn and more hell”) and the persuasive Jerry
Simpson, he Journeyed from one meeting place to another
inciting protest, arousing public confidence in via-
tory and the subsequent reform legislation. '

Bis efforts attracted the attention of B.O. Flower,
crusading editor of the Arena, who financed Garland.
on trips to Colorado, Kansas and Hebraska, interview-

ing farmers, speaking for the Populists, and recording

.A

ILm‘l"

 

 

26

'his experiences of the privation and discontent which
he witnessed for the areas; Thus it was that Garland
became a literary reformer. Encouraged by Kirkland
and Howells to write about the things he knew, presen-
ted with a concrete program of action by George and
the Populists and now offered a publication outlet in
the Azgga, Garland seised the opportunity to tell the
story of the impoverished farmer and to sow the seeds
of his own bitter rebellion.

“I grewup on a farm and I am determined

once and for all to put the essential

ugliness of its life into print. 'I will

not lie, even to be a patriot... I an a

competent witness and I intend to tell
the truth".

Three novels, A lember of the Third flousg, Iiififi
543319;, and A §pgil of Qggice; the collection of short
stories, !aig Travelled goadg and thgr Iaig gravellgg
figggg, and the drama 9999; the Wheel were the result of

this determination. Through these works march a parade.
of characters, slaves of the land, subjects of the most
brutal toil, victims of the perversity of nature and-
the parasitic demands of the landowner and speculator.
Always on the surface is Garland's bitter indictment
of the greedy landlord and the corrupt politician who
pernit this merciless exploitation.

1. Garland, Son of the giddle Border, 416.

 

 

 

Garland achieved his greatest eloquence in nggeg'
£h£.h12£1£.31!: a-short story in Igig_zz;ze;;1§_32§§gc
His protagonist, Ir. Haskins, leaves his farm, which
was destroyed by grass-hoppers in the Dakotas, to re-
turn to Wisconsin. Be rents a farm belonging to 11-
Butler, an owner-parasite. nlo slave in the Roman
galley: could have toiled so {rightfully and lived,
for this man thought he was free and that he was
working for his wife and babes'i.1 Bhientlessly,
nastins pressed his fanily into service to improve.
the farm which he hoped eventually to purchase. His
efforts are in vain,.however.' He discovers that his
ilprovements on what was once an almost worthless pro-
party have now added to its value and that his efforts
have served only to enrich Butler, who in consideration
of the improved value, proportionately increases the
purchase price. Though the moral injustice of the
' situation is readily apparent, haskins has no recourse.
The demands of Butler as the legal owner of the farm
would be upheld in courts, interpreting laws which per—
mitted the exploitation of ignorant but innocent victims.
_ Haskins is redrawn in nuaerous other characters in ‘
the Garland stories. Evident in them all is the faraers'
basic honesty, simple faith, and dogged determination

1. Garland, ggin Iravelleg 322d13,140-

 

 

 

to schieve security by their own efforts. with a.son¢
on their lips, they moved fiestward to wrest their live-
lihood from the soil. Their labors are frustrated and
their optimism crushed by ignorance and greed. Ien,
vouen and children tread the same vicious circle, their
‘cries of anguish ignored by the society which is res-
ponsible. Their~flsong of immigration had been in
effect the hymn of fugitives".1

A remarkable shift in emphasis followed Garland's
publication of the works cited. The storm of bitter'
protest which greeted his work startled him. The qual-
ity magazines took no interest in such frankly rebell-
ious material and only the most radical publications
nould‘publish it. Even his closest_friends warned him
.against being too caustic. It became apparent to Bar-
: land that he had taken the wrong course. His chief
ambition was to succeed as a writer and not as an ora-
tor and doctrinaire of political reform. His present
course aligned him with the radicals and not the
artists. ,

Garland decided to experiment. While still pub-
lishing his caustic reform material for the Arena, he

composed a short story called A Spring figgange, a rou-
antic three-part tale of Wisconsin which carefully

1. Garland. W2. 368

 

2.

 

 

avoided grim realities and controversy, and sent it
to Gilder of the Qggtggz, -Garland was startled to
find it accepted and to be paid the enormous sum of
five hundred dollars for the manuscript. He sub—
mitted a second attempt called W, a tri—
vial, sentimental tale of a June and December romance
in a western background. It too was accepted.

The experiment was very important in detemmining
Garland's subsequent career. He was flattered by the
recognition of Gilder, whom he regarded second only
. to Howells in literary Judgement, and more important,
he was convinced that his literary success could be
accomplished only by a more genteel literature. Gar-
land, therefore, made his decision. He chose to
follow Gilder whose tastes were aesthetic, rather than
Flower, whose interests were ethical. He established
himself in Chicago, no longer the militant crusader,
but the romantic artist, his energies no longer
directed toward social reform, but toward Social
criticism as a literary vehicle. His cause had now
become his material. As subjects and literary mat-
erial, all the unfortunates of the country came in-
to range. Still believing in the authenticity of
background and character types, he travelled widely
exploring new locales. Everywhere he found new un-

fortunates who needed an interpreter. One by'one,

,_ _',

’29

 

 

30

he espoused the cause of the Indian, the mountaineer,
the miner and the Alaskan primitive. .

He found real inspiration in the Indian problem.
Here was an opportunity for realism with an epic qual-
ity which his publishers were demanding. Here was a
whole new field of literary exploitation whose pro-
blems could be treated without running the risk of
giving personal offence or invoking controversy.
Garland said,

"The trip into Indian territory turned

out to be a very important event in my
life. First of all it enabled me to

complete the writing of the Eaptgig...
and started me on a long ser es 0

shOrt stories depicting the life of the

redman. It gave me an enormous amount

of valuable material and confirmed me

in my conviction that the Indian needed

an interpreter”.
And interpret‘them he did. He was convinced that the
redman was passing, ”as the buffalo had passed, as the
plains and the wild spaces were passing, as every wild
thing must pass before the ever thickening féood of
the white ploughmen pressing upon the land”. (It is
interesting to note that his former victims had theme
selves become oppressors.) '

The redman was passing because of the inhumanity

of the white man, which stemmed from two sources -—

1. Garland, Da-;oter 9f tee .hd' is -e., 182.
2. Garland, 4315' no - t e :- _... 413.

 

 

 

the popular contempt for the Indian and the blunders
of official Washington policies which were actually
intended to help him. A brief conversation of the
principals in the Qantaig 9f the fire: flora! 1:993
illustrates the popular attitude. In answer to a
question, nWhat is a savage?', he replies,
'A nan who needs converting to our faith“,
said Jennie.
”A nan to exercise the aray on”, said
laynard.
"A nan to rob in the name of the Lord“,
said Parker. 1
Garland also railed against the laws and policies
nade in Washington for the government of the Indian.
There was a concerted effort being made to locate ths
Indian geographically and to establish then as an
agrarian group.
”Any atteapt to sake the Tetong conform
_ to the isolated, dreary lonesome life
of the Western farmer will fail. fie had
always lived a coanunsl life, with the
voices of his fellows in his ears... He
seldom worked or played alone. His worst
punishment was to2be banished from the
camping circle".
According to Garland, the government's unenlightened
policy was Iaking the Indian Justly rebellious. He
suggested a program for group settlement which would

permit the Indian to keep his tribal associations.

1. Garland Qaptaig 9; the 9:21 flggse Irgop, 298.
2. this. 56. .

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

32

As for the government's feeble attempt at educa-

tion, Garland remarked,

"I am not one to be teaching creeds that
are dying out of our own life; to be clean,
to be peaceful, to be happy --- thise are
the precepts I would teach then.”

Garland had little patience with the writers who
regarded the Indian as a wild beast and savage. Be is
almost Rousseauistic in his concepts of the "noble
Savage". He observed,

“The scalp—dance no more represents the
rednan's daily life than the bayonet-chasge
represents the whiteman's civilization“.
the white man does not properly appreciate the Indian's
way of life. His natural environment is to be preserved
not destroyed.
"Ky conviction is that savager held more true
.happiness than we have yet rea ised and that
civilization does not advance the sun of human
happiness as it should".
If the white man would help the Indian, he must lead,
not coerce and he cannot afford to be unjust.
"The bearer of the torch should not burn,
he should illunine'. 4

Garland carried out this theme in a series of novels

developed out of his experiences with the Indian.. The

‘1. Garland Qgptain 91 the Qggz ggrse 1:092, 154
22. Ibid, 159.

1513, 298

2: IQ, 120 A

 

 

33

lost significant are the Qaptgig_gg_th3_grgxdflgggg
men WWW n . and WW
Indian. The gaptgig is a study of the Indian problems
through the eyes of a white nan who is frankly criti—
cal of the attitude of his own people. ghe Book 9;
.W is supposedly related by the
Indian who pictures his life as he endured it. A
highlight of the latter novel is the Indian version
of the famous Custer episode in which the Indians are
the heroes and Custer the victim of his own brutality
and aggression.

Garland was pleased and flattered at the success
of his Indian novels. He was delighted that the aud~
ience which had protested so loudly over the brutality
of his early work received his new effort with acclaim.

le tales of the Indian had created a friend-
lier spirit among my readers. my later the-es
were happily outside the controversial belt.

' Concerned less with the hopeless drudgery and
more with the epic side of western life, I
found nyself almost popular.”

Garland's decision to court the good will of his
readers had succeeded. He was‘deternined to peraan~
ently avoid controversy and offence, and passed from
a crusader into a Bonantic-Regionalist writer_of fic-

tion. His significance as a-social reformer had cone '
to an end.

1. Garland, Dagghte: of the giggle.§9rder, 182.

 

 

III
THE ROIAITIC-RILLIET

”Realism in America, whatever it owed. to conten-
porary skepticism and the influence of Darwinian, V
poured sullenly out of Agrarian bitterness, the class
hatreds of the eighties and nineties, the hleakness

f small-town life, the mockery 0f the nouveau: I
riches, and the bitterness in the great new proleté
arian cities."1 "No one invented it”, said Howells,
"it came".

That Garland first emerged as a realist can be
explained in at least three ways: V .

First, the realistic literary medium seemed best
suited to his demands for social reform, it offered-
the best opportunity for his expression of his youth.“
ful indignation. Garland had endured the life on the
border and was convinced that he could make others
know it as he knew it. He wrote,

'I was ready to concede with the realist
that the poet might go round the earth

and come back to find the things nearest.
at hand the sweetest and best of all, but

that certain injustices, certa cruel
facts must not be blinked at.”

Secondly, the sudden popularity of realism and the

success of its exponents were encouraging to an‘lppiring'

l. Kazin, Alfred, n at , lb.
2. Garland, So I t i d e , 384.

 

 

 

 

35

author. Howslls,isggleston and Kirkland wcra along
ths top writers of his day. A visit to Kirkland, tho
author of 2211, gave him ths impetus ha nssdad. Kirk-
land praised Garland's wastsrn sketches, urged his to
writs fiction of the bordar background, and convincad 1
Garland that ha night bacoas tha intsrprstsr of tho i
_ liddls last. Garland was furthar encouragsd by How- I I
all: who had already achisvsd much distinction as a
rsalist. The older man's sloqusnt inquiry into social.
svil thrillsd him, and his sucsass as a writsr inspired
him -- hsra was a champion such as the young Garland
drsamsd of becoming. His youthful impatience, his
personal frustrations firsd him to dig svsn dsspsr
and to probs more ruthlsssly into social problsns than
had his modal. "Whils I admirsd the grass, tho humor.
the satirs of Howalls' books, I was savsd from anyb
thing like imitation by ths darksr and stsrnar nat-
srial in which-I worked“.1

Thirdly, Garlandfis smsrganca as a realist ..s
most inaadiataly influéncad by his trip to Boston in
tbs sunnsr of 1887’shich ripsnad the sasds of ravolt
that had been sown intsrnittsntly throughout his boy-
hood. His trip and his studios thsrs had ssrvsd to

bring into sharpsr focus the miserable circumstances

1. Garland, 892 of tag giddls ggzdgg, 350.

 

 

 

36

in which he was born and deepened his enthusiasm to
write his protest of such appalling inequality.

'lew England, rich with its memories of
great men and women, had no direct inspir-
ation for me, a son of the lest. It did
not lay hold of my creative iaagination,
neither did it inspire me to sing of its
glory. ly desire to create the lest was
growing... I studied the land, musing up-
on its distinctive qualities and while-I
acknowledged the natural beauty of it, I
revolted from the gracelessness of its
human habitations... The lack of color,
and of charm in the lives of its people
anguished me. I asked myself, 'Ihy have
the stern facts never been put into our
literature as they have been used in
Russia and in England?" 1

_ Painfully aware of the injustice and cruelty which
were the lot of the border farmer and which were iden-
tified with Garland's own frustration, the indignant
Garland burned to tell the painful as well as the
pleasant truth.

' 'I began to write, composing in a glow of-
flaming conviction... I had no doubts, no
hesitations about the kind of effect 1- “
wished to produce. I perceived little that
was humorous in the man who, with hands
like claws, was scratching a scanty living
from the soil of a rented farm; while his wife
walked her ceaseless round from tub to churn
and from churn to tub. On the contrary, the
life of such a family appealed to ne as al-
aost unbelievable in its futility." 2' '

There followed.lain.!na:allad_nnads,.nthsz.lain

1. Garland fign 9f the giddlg aggdgg, 350.
2. Ibid, 181.

 

 

 

 

 

was. and W. which town-r

‘form his most-significant realistic work. They are

grim, gloomy tales, told in settings of shanty-like

'cabins of rude furniture and plank floorings. Outside

are the flies, the odor of barnyards and the inevi-

table dust or muds In such habitations the toiling

' men and women sink at times almost to the level of

beasts. They are ugly and often ridiculous, but
heartbreaking in their rude despair. Warped with
poverty and toil, they take on the pitiful subter-
fuge of a Daddy Deering, or the terrible rebellion of

‘ a Lucretia Burns. _Their physical ugliness is as '
,nothing in the face of their spiritual degradation.

Their lives of toil produces savage passions and a

vigorous brutality towards their fellow men, as is

' demonstrated in such tales as lilliam ggcgn'g [an

and ; zreagner'g Love Story. ‘Ignorance and nisunder-.

standing permit a queStion of property to bring about
‘ inisign in the coolly. the careless and negligent
brutality of her husband and the nagging of her in-
laws make Agnes Kinney's life a purgatory. Years of
unrecognized labor bring dreadful rebellion to-Lucre-
tia Burns. is Douglas nadburn sums up the situation,

*len who toil terribly in filthy garments

day after day and year after year cannot

easily keep gentle; sooner or later, the
frost and the grime, the heat and the cold

 

- _ - .l . -
, 5
.w..-

.‘-v- - ~
J‘s-Os)

e ' - I-i‘ .Lé?o

. ~

 

 

www v —'—— : "~~-v ' - WW'r—v 7“ ‘—

38

will_enter into their souls. The case is
not-all in favor of the suffering wives

and against the brutal husbands. If the
farner's wife is dulled and crazed by her 1
routine, the farnir himself is degraded . '
and brutalised. " '

There are brighter aspects in the Garland settings,

but they accentuate rather than mitigate their essen-
tial ugliness. Garland admits in his preface to fitter

lain Izgvelled Bgads that

"youth and love are able to transform a
bleak prairie town into a poem, and to
make of a Earbed-wire lane a highway of
romance“.

Yet, watching the nerrynaking of the Groves Schools

- min-2mg. r. . -

house, the gaiety of the racing drivers, the shy
”coupling off' in the internissione of fern labor, we
are confronted always by the question of how long the
youthful love will last, how long before the rosy,
laughing girls will be transformed into gray and shape-
less slatterns, the dashing youths into surly brutes.
the landscape, marred only by the habitationa of Ian,
loses no: a shit of the beauty it bore to the dreaning
eyes of the prairie boy; but,

”how much consolation does the worn and
weary renter find in the beauty of cloud

1. Garland, Other Iain Travelled Roads, 112-13
2. :bid, VIII .

 

 

 

and tree or in the splendor of the sunset?
Grace of flower does not feed or clothe the'
body, and when the taller is both badly
clothed and badly fed, bird song and leaf-
shine cannot bring content”. 1

,The most terrible thing about the stories is
the hopelessness of their outlook; most of the éhnr-
acters seem to come to an absolute impasse. the hero
of ‘ §§gp gee: At 11;: is literally farced by circum-
stances into a marriage that strikes a deathublow to
all his aubitions. He "Jumped into a hole and pulled
the hole in after him“; In gy41g3_§ggllz, the inequal-
ities of opportunity and environment nake the brother
who went to New York rich and successful, the younger,
who stayed behind and took up his father's burdens,
poor and oppressed with a bitter sense of failure.

The tales are filled with scenes that are syn-
bolic. Garland is at his best in the tender, path-
etic story of larthe, in ggnigg;§h3_figg_ggggg_pggg, .
who does'nt care to live but who never thought she
would die so early and so unsatisfied, who never got
to I'the sunny place we girls used to think we'd get
to”, who never found rest except in death. We find
Simeon Burns trying to puzzle out the situation over
which Democrats.and Republicans, Grangers and Green-
beckers disputed while hard-working, discouraged far-

ners in bewildered and wordless resentment toiled on.

1- Gerlmd, W. 368.

.e‘
A
' I

 

 

Ie discover‘lillians, the frustrated violinist who
turned to alchohol for his fulfillment. We see the
despair of poor Haskins after his years of killing
and fruitless labor who was "under the lion's pgw...
half hid in the mist and there'was no way out”.
“The toilers are indeed of the Iain Trav-
elled Roads, the roads arid and brown with
the chocking dust of the summer, desolate
with the dingy mud and stinging snow of
winter the road long and wearisone al-
most always ungracious t9 the laborim
feet that traverse it". l
The denunciation of the stories was innediate ‘
and bitter. “Editorials of criticism poured into i
the office', wrote Garland, "all written to prove
that my gictures of the liddle Border were utterly
false". -
There is no doubt that this criticism was a major
factor in the remarkable change in Garland which was
mentioned earlier. Sensitive, insecure, and burning
with a desire to succeed, Garland was hurt and fright-
ened by the storm of protest hnd the accusations of
.bad taste. Painfully aware of his hunble origins,
the accusations of crudity hit Garland in his nost

sensitive area. Eager for approbation, he had slaw-

ishly imitated what he considered was good taste.

1. Garland, la in Iravelled goadg, ?16
2. Dondore, Dorothy i e a
e 523.
,0 1' a , on Of t 9 1dd , I‘ , 318s

«1‘-
A

 

 

 

Here indeed was a dilemma. Garland hiaself and
.his literary friends felt that he had the greatest
chance for success in his interpretation of the fron-
tier. His deep-seated moral indignation insisted up-
on a realistic treatment of that frontier. However,
the people who bought his bOOks and those who would '
insure his literary and financial success were shocked
and horrified by the brutal truth. Garland was bee
wildered. He had a message to give and yet he dared
not to offend. He tried a reconciliation ~ he dao
cided to straddle the fence.‘ He would write of the
border and the things he knew but he would aroid in-
iury to the tender sensibilities-of his readers.
His earlier statements.

”Obscurely forming in my mind were two

great literary concepts p‘that truth was

a higher quality than beauty, and that

to spread the reign of Justice should

everywhere be the design and intent of

the artist. The nerely beautiful in art

seemed petty, and success at the cost of

the happiness of others a monstrous ego-
tiSIe' '

had given way to -

”I must be careful to keep a certain bal-'
ance between Significance and Beauty. The
artist began to check the preacher".

Garland subsequently avoided controversy. Be

1- Garland W 374.
2. ppm, 1.13.

 

 

 

'- * —v ' v '- ' ‘- ‘o ' '—"" ' va~"r-“w. "iq
. - ‘ a .

abandoned his antagonistic crusading spirit in favor
of a tempered, conciliatory approach. By 1893, he
had passed into a Bonantic-Regionalist writer of fic-
tion. 8till longing for a certain authenticity of
background, he extended his range over the entire
Iestern half of the United States. A whole series
of romantic novels followed. '

0f the romantic novels, s' f c 0
(1895) is the most significant, for in it the reader
can discover at least three of the nedia which flat-
land consistently enployed.. In it can be found the

reanante of his crusading spirit, his pleas for the

I .
a' .‘x-Kh‘. A

border victims. Rose was born in an uninspiring en-
vironment. Her father worked tirelessly to Iaintain
his fern and to provide small comforts and advantages
for Bose. He sought to protect her from the fate of
the border women who.
"at sixteen had beaux, at seventeen many
actually married, and at eighteen night
often be seen with their husbands, covered
with dust, clasping wailing babies in
their arms and who at twenty were not
infrequently thin and bent in the shoulders
and flat and stiff in the hips,‘hating-de-
generated into sallow and querulous wives
of slovenly, careless husbands". .
John Butcher, intending a better fate for Rose, spared

her the drudgery of the field and gave.her instead an

1. Garland, 0 e_o tcher's oo 1 , 71.

 

 

 

opportunity for education and culturs. .Bs'wantsd an
“aoconplish9d and rsfinad young lady to graca his lonsly
life and to comfort his old ago. In providing an educ-
ation for host, he lost hsr. Rosa's kcon mind was
“quickly notad by her trachar, who inflamed hsr with a
dosira to sntsr tho University. Raluotantly, loan
Dutchsr was influsncad to arrange it.

The second strand, Garland's sntry into romantic
fiction, is here evidant. Rose, tbs sensitivs and '
gifted hsroins, by virtue of a University training
and the tutorship of ths Thatcher family, is trans-
formed from a rude country girl into an accompllahjd
and rsfinad young lady. Bar chars and ratinsnsnt and
her ladyliks graces (vith which-all the Garland nol~
antic woman wars endowed) tins hsr many admirers. Sho
becomes an accepted part of a culturod circle, dia-
cussss politics, art, and morality rith ease, and cran-
tually marries an accomplishad husband.

lost significant is tha third strand in Egg; which
is prophetic of Garland's aost successful aodiua - -
autobiography. Aside from the fact that Rose is a
woman, it is really Garland's story that ha toll! in
her story._ Rose's yearning and struggles.to succsod,
hor passion for recognition, and tho tyns of suocsss
which shs'achisvad are all characteristic of Garland'a'

early ambitions. 5939 is truly tho forerunner of

 

 

 

Garland's most successful work, WW

. '.It was sometime after Eggg, however, before Gar-

. land became,truly autobiographical. For the next tit-
teen years, he had all but abandoned his border cru-
sade and devoted himself almost entirely to romantic
fiction. '~It would not be accurate to say that he

was no longer a noralist because in all of the stories
he champions some cause or other, but the tone, char-
acters and narrative are romantic. There is a strange

combination of a-typical heroes or heroines in a paine-

'takingly authenticated background. MW
W..W¢atni o s. . se '

muscle. Mam and new are
all illustrative of Garland's Romantic—Regionalist

fiction. They indicate too his transition from a
middle border local colorist. His expanding interest
in material carried him from his native scenes to the
East, South, far West and the mountains. Garland was
no longer a spokesman and a champion, he was a land-
scape and portrait artist. .

It is interesting to note in passing that Garland's
lountain stories of the period were Inch less hitter
than his prairie tales. Garland explains, .

”All of my emotional relationships in the

'High Country' were pleasant, my sense of
responsibility less keen, hence the noted

A

45

resentment and opposition to unjust social
conditions which made my other books and
articles an offence to my readers were al-
most entirely absent in my studies of the
mountaineers. .Lcnely as their lives were,
it was not a sordid lonliness. The cattle
rancher was at least not a drudge. Care-
less and slovenly arc tastefu as I knew
him to he, he was not mean".

The explanation is quite acute, partiCularly the
observation of his lessened responsibility. Consider-
ing the fact that Garland was deliberately avoicing
controversy, this factor was even more important in
the tempering of the belligerent and polemic quality
which appeared in his earlier works. The border in-
justices were a personal injury and his protest and
social criticism a personal inventive. In the roman-
tic novels, whose backgrounds are a safe distance from
the scene of his own frustrations, Garland is sole to
review the social problems of others with S'npethetic
delicacy. He could not hoeever, be so dispessionate
in the handling of problems that were so immediately
identifiable with his own.

His biography of 0.5. Crant, uritteh during this
period (1898), is also clearly inc satire of the de—
cline of the "unflinching realist", as Garland once

called himself. Still clingin to his rassicn for

he

authentic detail, Garland ”visited every torn wherein

1. Garland, Laufihter of the Middle Border, 229.

 

 

Ulysses Grant lived long enough to leave a distinct
impression upon its citizens in a search for first
hand material".1 The sum total is far from a realistic
treatment, however. Grant has probably never been so
thoroughly culogized or white-washed. He is always
the gentlencn, scholar, and patriot. Garland absolve:
his, not by evidence but by a testimony of faith, from
any taint of the scandal which so characterized the ‘
Grant administration, making him guilty of nothing
more than the human error of misplaced trust when the
charges of corruption which were brought against tho
Revenue Department reached into the Presidentinl Cab-
inet. Be absolves him from any complicity in the in-
famous Vhrd scandal, indicating again that Grant's
faith in the honesty of his fellow men had made hit
the dupe of unscrupulous cheats. It is significant
thnt he mentions not a whit of Grant's deterioration
and drinking following the Presidency. The sole cans.
of his ill health is a cancer of the throat and through-
out his illness, Grant remains the sober, considerate
patient and patriot. There can be no doubt that in
his search for material, Garland discovered much of
the unpleasant truth, but he no longer had the inclin-
ation or the courage to print what was ugly or offen-

sivo. The Grant biography was another offering on tho

1. Garland, Ulzsgeg a. Grant, flis Life 399 gaggggtgg, V.

' x

A

 

 

Aw

altar of appease-ant. .

By 1917, Garland had rsturnod to his first sub—
Jsot and he had found his best nsdiun, autobiography.
His ggg 9; tag ligdlg figrdg; is without doubt his
grsstast worh.' Garland hinsslf is the control figurs,
. but out of tho naval omsrgs sons of tho-finest chur-
sctors of Amsrican litaraturs, characters who or.

. poignant and unforgotable boosuso thsy or! real -
Garland's rigid yat kindly father, whose pioneer spirit
and constant search for grasnsr pasturss loads tho
family over the border which Hamlin can. to know so
well; Ira. Garland, who represents the idosl of all

the pionear mothers, a loving, hard working, uncon-
plaining frontisr woman who used all.hsr strength to
ssrvo tha material needs of her family and hsr native
refinunont to bring sweetness and inspiration to hsr
children; Uncle David, ths handsons, auscular, laughing
giant who could work with awssona intensity but.in
whoa; soul stirrsd tuneful melodies which, when pro-
duced on tho violin, brought gaisty to his noighbors
and lightnsss to thsirltirsd foot; The IcClihtocts;

the Babcocks; Profsssor Bush; all cons to life on
those pagas, and Garlandfs own 11:. and experiencos
this on an interssting reality. In striking detail,

he noted his reactions to his snvironnsnt and tho in-

fluences upon his dovelopmont. as trscsd his story

A
‘0

from the farm to the seminary to Boston and Chicago,
ending with his residence there in 1893. They are
chapters cut from life, a warm and interesting human
experience.

A gaughter of the Middle Border is the second of
the series. It carries on the family history from
1893 and tells of Garland's marriage to Zumile, his
struggles to establish Chicago as an art center, the
birth of his daughters and the death of his mother and
father. It is a family history from 1393 to 1914.
Though he was awarded the Pulitzer prize for the
Daurhter in 1921, it does not equal the literary mas-
tery of the £93. Garland himself felt that the award
was given to the Qaushter as a continuation of the
first work. Garland is still the central character
of this book but notable missing are the border scenes
and personalities. The s93 chronicles Garland's
struggle to rise above his environment. The Btu- ter
outlines his struggle with his art.

The third biographical novel, Trail Makers of the
Middle Border is chronologically first in the series
of the family history. It is the story of Garland's
father in Maine, his subsequent removal to Wisconsin,
and his fortunes there. grail Makers, thotgh it does
capture some of the border color, is not equal to the

Son. It is an attempt to resurrect the story from the

49

memory of his father's accounts.

"I had in mind the desire to express the
allurement which the woods ans srairie
lands of Wisconsin had for my father as

a youth. Much of it was precisely as I
remember him telling it, but as many parts
of it had to be inferred, I was moved to
change the names in it Just enough to in—
dicate the part which my imagination played
in the effort to connect up the known facts
of his life. I hoped to embody it with
some part of the adventurous spirit which
made the early fifties one of the most glam—
orous of our decades of discovery and
settlement".1

Unfortunately, however, Garland the imaginist did not
have the strength of Garland the observer. His father's
story is an idealized, imaginative narrative in a back-
ground more romantic than real.
Each Trailersflfrom theihiddle Burger is the least

effective of the autobiographical series. It is not
so much a story as it is an apology. Garland, con-
scious of criticism, defends in it his removal to New
York and his apparent abandonment of his native ground.
He supports his action by saying,

“In taking the back-trail, we are as trpi»

cal of on times as our fathers were of

theirs.”
and, cites numerous illustrations to prove that he was
not alone in the exodus. Howells, Hay, Eagleston,
Twain, Harte, Markham, Masters, Pound, Fletcher, Eliot,

1. Garland Back- ailerg from the Middle Border 162.
2. Ibid, viii“. "" I '

and Hemingway were, in his opinion, all back-trailers
to the literary centers, recognizing the need for cul-
tural association“and the expediency of being near
their publishers.

Back—Trailers clearly reveals the evolution of
Garland. There was no doubt that he preferred the ease
and comfort and artistic stimulation of his New York

life to that of the ioneer. He reveled in the warmth

‘U

of his apartment, remembering how he almost froze to
death in a frontier cabin. He loved to push buttons

for serVice, to find his milk at his door.

"There are still people who love to farm,
to milk cows, to pick fruit and to dig
potatoes - how else would we go on eating;
but such things are not for me. I have had
my share of activities. I am content to
feed my goldfish and exercise my dog on

the roof. I do not intend to play the
hypocrite in the matter, urging others to
go West as did Horace Greeley, while enjoy-
ing Times Square and Upper Brcscway to .
myself."

By 1923, Garland's happiest home was Madison Square
and his'Triends of the city meant more than my Wis~
consin neighbors".2 Garland was now comfortably es-
tablished and respected as a writer. His break with
Agrarians and Populists was complete.

It is significant that Garland backotrailed not

1. Garland, Back~Trailers from the middle Border, 165.
2. Ibid, 263.

51

only from the border but from his earlier native
Americanism. His.fierce desire to acquire taste took
him beyond the American scene. He traveled to London
and found naive pleasure in establishing residence
there, fairly gloating over the success of the Wis-
consin farm boy who can provide European residence
for his children. He reveled in the glories of Eng-
lish historical lore, its architecture and its artists,
flagrantly courting the areat and near-great and is
flatulent in their recognition. His most serious soc-
ial problem now is whether he should or Should not
give way to his former conviction and appear in a
formal cost.
He back-trailed too from his earlier opinion of
wealth. Having benefitted from the attention of the
privileged, and having acquired a small but respect-
able corner on the world's goods, he felt inclined to
Justify the Capitalism he onCe reviled.
”All my life I heard much of the corruption
of riches, the domination of the millionaire,
and the criminal use of gold... It is only
fair to say thit in mv later years I have
found Iaelth to be a Justifying, civilizing
agent.”

At fifty—nine , Carl: nd did not welcome violent change

nor did he aspire to actively champion the cause of

the underdog. Of the printers? strike he said,

1. Garland, Back Trailers from the Middle_Bcrder, 123.

”It may mean ruin to many of the period-
icals and in this misfortune writers will
share. It is all a part of the necessary
and inevitable reconstruction of labor.

So long as it moves in accordance with law,
I have no complaint to make, but when it
calls for a proletarian dictatorship, I
become a conservative."1‘

Garland feebly attempts to reconcile this attitude

with his former position.

"Although a fairly consistent Republican,

I have no antagonism to titles which have

been won by scholarship, integrity, states-
manship and hard work... I believe in

Ibsen's 'aristocracy of mind, character and
will'. An inherited title is another thing." 2

It is obvious that this is again a personal Justifica-
tion. Garland made the transition from poverty to
moderate substance by dint of sacrifice and hard work.

He felt that his achievement had earned him the right

to privilege.

Garland moved a long way from Howells' prediction

in 1894 ~

"Garland... is taking on the world ingeniously
and interestingly and he will never be soph-
isticated and I hope that he will never lose
the simplicity of his ideal, sure as it was
when he had Kain Travelled Roads under his
feet and throbbed with his fine, angry sym-
pathy for the 'familiar and the low'". 3

The angry if not the fine voice was stilled. Com~

1. Garland gack-Trailers from the Middle Border, 128.
2. Ibidi 2i2.
1

3. Howe
ican, 178, 1894, 523-24.

5, William, "Mr. Garland's Books", North Amer-

52

fortable and almost smug in his financial security,
Garland turned to reminiscent dreaming and self.-~

appraisal. With exaggerated humility in his accom-

O
W
m
m

plishment, Garland undertook to explain his suc

and to evaluate his fellO‘s. Garland, the reformer

{L
w...
:3”
tJ
O
'1
H
5'?
H
0
O

and would-be artist, had become Carlan

53

54

IV
LITERARY THEORY

Garland's early success as a social critic and
literarv realist encouraaed him to direct his efforts
toward literary criticism. Shortly after his removal
from Boston to Chicago, he puhlished Crumbling Idols
(1894), which contained twelve essays of his artistic
philosophy, a somewhat windy but sincere plea for a
native American literature. The essays contain five
principal arguments:

1. Garland vigorously espouses the realistic med-
ium believing that "truth is of greater significance
than beautv" and that the design and intent of the
artist should be to spread the reian of Justice. The
writer is at once a crusader who addresses himself to
a mind prepared to listen. He G;S rovs what is evil
by displacement and not by attacking it directly.

2. Realistic treatment of subjects demands an
intimate knowledge of them. Garland therefore urged
localism as a means to the realistic method. He be~
lieved that writers should confine themselves to the
specific areas with which thev were familiar, and
should treat of these areas faithfully and conscien-
tiously, communicating their particular problems to
the world. Localism is essentially an educating and

reform +echnique.

'55

merican litera-

3’

3. Garland pleaded for a native
ture. He repudiated European influences and even re-

belled against the cultural leadership of the east,

0
U
(9
P“
u)
a l
L":
k...)
«1
L)
(f
w
“I
d
(U
Q.
P’ ,
:1
up
LL
*1
0
'C
d.
m
:3
(1'
'1
0‘
I

which he felt was h

dition. To Garland, a native literature was essen-

ern civilization was singularly American.
4. Garland declared that a native American lit-

erature

m

hould stress the trpicallr American philos-
ophies of Democracy, Individualism and Progress as
opposed to Aristocracv, Cubservience and Ponservatism.
His own philosophy at the time as essentially optim-

istic, liberal and humanitarian.

"If the past was bond, the future will be
free. If the past was feudalistic, the
future will be democratic... If the past
was the history of a few titled personal-
ities riding high in obscure waves of name-
less, suffering humanity, the future will
be the day of high average personality,
the abolition of all privilege, the peaco-
ful walking together of brethren, equals
before nature and before the law. And
fiction will celebrate this life.”

5. Garland advocated a realism which, though it
was searching and representative, would remain on a
level of moral decency.

"I resent those who would sluice upon us
the worst in place of the best in Europe.

1. Garland, Crumbling Idols, 45-6.

56

The cynical blsgue of Paris, or the degen-
erate drama of Vienna is not t.e kind of
culture the smericun Academv would import,
Just as it is opposed to the excortetion

of the worst and not the best of our own
plays and novels. We stand for an exchange
of the best and not the worst of modern
art". 1

He advocated new aorms and A?" tn,nes and opposed the

revival of old Obscenities, vices and crimes. He ar-
gued for characteristic New World subiects and not

\-, ‘ ‘ ‘. h
he; of the rest".

‘9

the "worn-out sexual th

“The new literature is concerned with the
most hackneyed of all themes, seduction,
robbery and murder. I advocated a fiction
which was representative of the decent ver-
nge not of the exceptionally bestial.”

Garland's early optimistic faith in America is

readily apparent. He calls hi self a disciple of Spen-

l

cer, believing in the ineVitablity of change, which he

was sure, would be for the better. But, he exclaimed,

"until men come to see system and retro-
gression, and an endless but definite success-
ion in art and in literature as in geologic
change, until the law of’nrcgress was enun-
ciated no conception of the future and no
reasonable history of the past could be
formulated".

Garland saw the literarv artist as t‘e educator and re-

former who would bridge the gap between the distressing

,4.
"J
4
\U
D.
,4-
:5;
p+
,4.
:3"
{0

present and the brighter future. He be:

1. Garland flack Trailers from the Mid 1e Border 157
20 Ibid’ 1&5“ o ,

3. Garland, grumbling Ldols, 43.

 

57

writer, if he performed his true function, would edu-.
cate others in social dynamics and would arouse them.
to endorse and actively support desirable social..
changes.

Garland's plea for a native Americanism in liter-
ature was not restricted to Crumbling Idol . Ha rc-

peats the theme in geek—Trailers and gives it a more
complete treatment in an article written for Qurreng

92inion in 1924.

"In short, our fiction and our drama are

in the process of being Europeanized.

The themes and methods of treatment are
increasingly alien to our tradition. Since
the war, the number of our writers who are
imitating the French, the Norwegian, and
the Russian has notably increased. Half of
the plays on our stage this year are said
to be adaptations of farces from Vienna and
Paris and several of our younger novelists
are bringing to our fiction that eroticism
which has so long been the peculiar prov-
ince of the French novel. In others, the
brutal plainess of speech of certain Scan.
dinavian writers and the pessimistic anim-
alism of modern Russian novelists appear
while many of the English novels imported
by our publishers are of the decadent quale
ity of Matisse and Archipenko. Design is
lost. The sense of humor which should be
corrective is absent. It would seem that
we are importing the vices and not the vir-
tues of the Old World Art." ‘

Garland turned his guns not only upon the foreign
importations but upon the foreign element in America,
particularly in New York, which could'nt escape in-
filtration. I

1. Garland, ”Art in Our Times} ngrent Qpinion,
(Feb., 1924) 125.

58

.These concentration camps of foreign~

born residents, many of them not citizens,

had begun to affect our art, our drama,

our fiction #— in some ways to the good,

but more often to the bad. The moving

picture, the sensational press and the

brutal novel flourished in this rank soil.

In the.reek of the city, an anti-American,

anti-Puritain criticism had developed.

These writers, European_in tone and cyn—

ical in outlook set about to belabor the

rest of an*rica into their way of think-'

ing... The alien element made New York

a source of iorruption in literature and

in morals.‘
This narrow and chauvinistic attitude is indeed far
removed frOm the position he once held as a reformer-
and radical.

vGarland saw Chicago as the great inland city of

native America. In spite of its raucous and brawl-
ing exterior, he felt that it had great promise in
the development cf the arts. He worked energetically
to make it an artistic center free from the corrup-
tion of European influences, courting artist, sculp-
tors, musicians and writers in an effort to attract
them to Chicago. He devoted his energies to estab~
lish a midwestern artistic circle, founded the Cliff
Dwellers, which was a meeting place for midland art-
ists and writers, helped to establish the Century
. Club for the same purpose, and solicited the finan~
cial backing of an art patron, Archer Huntington, to

secure the site of the present library. He was an

1. Garland, ack- a lers f om the dd . der, 312.

59

ardent promoter of the ”salon" as a gathering place
for talent and a means for artistic or philOSOphical
conversation, aimed to exert a creative influence up-
on the literary personalities. '
Garland did not remain long in Chicago, however.
The artists he sought to attract never arrived in
satisfactory numbers, the publishing houses which
were to make Chicago a publication center never mat-
erialized. After extensive trips gathering material
for the Li;1_9£‘fi;§hg. Garland returned to New York,
confident that his future lay in the East and con-
vinced that his Chicago dream would never be realised.
Simultaneous with Garland's retreat from his in-
dignant social protest and his vigorous realistic
writing was his abandonment of his earlier literary
views. Garland after his return to New York no longer
preached “democratic art" in the old sense. Actually,
the shift had begun even earlier. A previous chapter
cited 3053 Q: pgtchgr's ngllz as a key work signaling
Garland's decline as a crusader. This work offers '
similar illustration of his shift in critical theory,
in line with his fierce desire to acquire taste:
"Taste is our weak point in America, and

in the rural regions . . . well, there is'nt
wany taste above that for shortcake, dollar

chromos and the New Xogk Beggaitorz.‘ 1

1. Garland, figs: 9f putcher's Qggllx, 387.

60

There can be no doubt of Garland's course after l893.
Careful toavoid controversy, he eagerly acquired
culture in an effort to ingratiate himself with his
public.

But Garland was far from gratified with the re-
sults of this decision. ‘His books, prepared in this
new vein, were enjoying only a very modest success.

9 He felt that the newspapers were ignoring him. He
was bitterly disappointed when the new medium of the
motion pictures, after one dismal attempt to film
Eggplg, passed up his material. The magazines were
catering to a newly enfranchized public whose taste
Garland called flippant, ephemeral and vulgar.

By 1928, it was apparent to Garland that his
attempt to steer a middle course was a failure. It
was clear that he would have to align himself with
those who labored for art or those who labored for
popular approval. In Bacg-zgailegs, Garland announced
his decision. His statement is as much a rational-
ization for his very modest success as it is an ex-
planation.

'ly position is that of an intellectual
aristocrat; I have no.confidence in a

'democratic art', if by that phrase is

meant an art based on popular approval.
With due regard for the welfare of the
average man, I do not value his Judge-
ment upon wall‘paper or rugs or paint-
ings. Why should'his verdict on a book

or a play be considered something mysti—
cally sure and high and final? The Tol-

stoyan belief in the intuitive rightness
of the peasant has always affected me as
sentimental nonsense. I am gratified
‘when my work appeals to-a large number of
my fellow republicans, but if one of my
books were to have a very wide sale, I
should at once lose confidence in its
quality. The Judgement of the millions
when it comes to a question of art is essen-
tially wrong. Furthermore, as one who be-
lieves in selection, I have helped to form
various clubs and societies where merit
counts above success or good citizenship
or social position. Wild as I may have
been on political economy, I have never
believed in artistic anarchy. Ethics and
esthetics are separated fields of thought
in my world."

' In the same text, Garland claims to have gained
much more personal satisfaction from his invitation
to Fellowship in the American Academy than he could
ever have had from popular success. Of his accept-
ance in 1918 Garland said,

"To be chosen as a fellow by these most
distinguished 'senators' was an honor of
the highest value, more than a degree from
a University, for it was a call to Somrade-
ship with the men I most honored."

There can be no doubt of the sincerity of this ,
statement. Entrance into the Academy was in part
at least a realization of Garland's ambitions, for
it symbolized an accomplishment in the art to which
he aspired and won for him the recognition of the

men he idolized. It meant that he was no longer a

1. Garland geek-Trailers from the gigdle gogdgg, 78-80.

 

2.11;;g,7.

62

rude country pumpkin on the fringe of culture, but
as artist and a member of a charmed circle. It is
significant, however, to note Garland's change in
attitude toward the Academy once he had been accep-
ted. He no longer thought of membership in the head.
emy as a reward for devoted public service as he once
had, but he thought of it as a group apart, a hall-
owed circle of distinguished arbiters in the world
of art.

"Such an crganization is needed in a demo—

cracy at a time when economic ideals are

confused with esthetic principles and

where the tendency is to regard the ballot

box as a means of Judging what is best in

art.“ 1

Thus it is easily apparent that Garland became

much more thoroughly aristocratic in his literary
views than he did in his economic philosophy. Though
he had never abandoned a passive sympathy for the
common man in his economic struggle, he disdained his
esthetic Judgement.

“Wishing the average man all his rights,

and willing to strengthen his demand for

a Just wage, I refused to accept his 11t-

erary Judgement. 'Democracy in Art' is
a specious phrase." 2 '

Garland's position can in part be explained by

1. Garland, Com anions on the Trail, 211.
2. Garland, Back Trailers from the Middlefigrder, 189.

his inability to produce what the public demanded.

"The magazines", he said, "were demanding hot stuff,

1 °
and I had no such hot stuff to give". It can be

explained too by a natural distaste for vulgarity
which lead Garland to repudiate the frank EurOpean
realism which he never cane to understand. Whether
this is a strength or a weakness is debatable, but
it is significant that Hamlin Garland, the middle-
roader, had at long last declared himself and taken
a definite stand. His declaration came too late,
however. Except for the lip service he continued
to pay to the localistic fiveritism' which he once
so vigorously espoused, he thoroughly repudiated
Qrggbligg Idols and its appeal for courage and orig-
inality. His career as a creative artist was fin-

ished.

64

v
GARLAND'S STYLE

Garland's metamorphosis of style follows the same
general pattern as his evolution from reformer to lit-
erary aesthete. His early works are characterized by
harshness, bluntness,.and an indifference to the more
delicate nuances of style. In simple, direct lang-
uage, he presented the unlovely facts, writing power-
fully with a force that grew out of his own flaming
convictions. His words are simple and earthy, delib—
eratelv pointed. Men did not perspire, they sweat;
cows were not odorous, they stank; men were not in-
different, they were shiftless; women were slatternly,
slovenly; landscapes were cold or torrid and always
cheerless; employment was bondage, brutal toil; houses
were shacks and hovels. In keeping with the picture
he intended to portray, Garland's language was blunt,
polemic and powerful. His sentences were snort and

forceful and the imagery startling and grim. A pass-
age from Lucretia Burns is typical:

"Lucretia Burns had never been handsome,
even in the early days of her girlhood.
Now she was middle-aged, distorted with
work and childbearing, and looking faded
and worn as one of the boulders that lay
beside the pasture fence near where she
sat milking a large white cow.

She had no shawl or hat and no shoes
for.it was still muddy in the little yard

65

where the cattle stood patiently fight-
ing the flies and mosquitoes swarming in-
to their skins already wet with blood...
She rose from the cow's side at last,
and taking her pails of foaming milk,
staggered toward the gate. The two pails
hung from her lean arms; her bare feet
slipped on the filthy ground; her greasy
and faded calico dress showed her tired
and swollen ankles, and the mosquitoes
swarmed mercilessly on her neck and bedded
themselves in her colorless hair."

Garland's description of a prairie school is also

typical of his forthright bitterness:

"Many a girl caught her death-cold in that
miserable shack, and went to her grave a gen-
tle martyr to shiftless management."2

In language which was pithy and incisive, Garland the
reformer sharply uttered his indictment against society.
Garland's shifting of emphasis from reform to lit-
erary romanticism brought about a corresponding change
in style as well as in attitude. In fiespgr (1903), his
description of the heroine, Ann Rupert, makes her a

very different person from Lucretia Burns.

”Raymond was fairly abashed by the grace and
youthful charm of his visitor. She reminded
him of the stories he had read of princesses
visiting the huts of their peasantry. She
was of good height, but the proud life of her
head made her seem taller than she was, and
the cut of her gown, the color of her gloves
and hat, told of good taste and the service
of the best tailors and milliners... Ordin—
arily the only color in her rather impassive

1. Garland, gther Ma n Travell-d goad:
2. Garland, Bo' - f- on th_ 'ra “_

    

66

face lay in the vivid scarlet of her lips

and the deep gray of her eyes, but, today,

she was radiant with the most delicate pink.

She was as dazzling as the bride in the songs

of Solomon, and the young ranchers were awed

and humbled".
In his consuming desire for literary success, Garland
was willing, even eager, to imitate certain of the form-
ulae which his successful exemzlars had followed. He
admired the grace and charm of Howells who, though a
reformer, was never caustic or brutal. When Garland
was alarmed and hurt.by the protest which greeted his
gain Iravelled Roads, he consulted Howells who advised
him to be fine and to temper his hostility. He also
consulted Kirkland who warned him not to preach but
to exemplify. To Garland, both men were riding an
enviable wave of popularity and their advice greatly
influenced him. Garland eagerly studied both and
other recognized stylists in his determination to
improve.

' The moSt striking and obvious evidence of Garland's
conscious imitation can be found in a poem in §21_L1_3.
Describing a wild goose, he wrote:

"Ah! Say you so, bold sailor,
In the sunlit deeps of the sky, A
Dost thou so soon the seed of time tell

As circling in yon shoreless sea
Thine unseen form goes drifting by?I 2

1. Garland, Hes e , 34-5
2. Garland, Boi Eife Qn Ihe Erairie, 73-4.

67

The obvious similarity of the verse to Bryant's Ig_‘
Waterfowl is readily apparent. moreover, the teche
nique of Apostrophe, the form, and the imagery are
too similar to suggest an unconscious imitation. The
work was undoubtedly an experiment.

Garland was convinced of the wisdom of a more ele-
gant style when the Century, a magazine which he felt
was an unquestionable organ of refinement, accepted
his Wisconsin fiomance, his first major aesthetic ex-
periment. Progressively, his characters become less
rude, nature less malevolent, landscapes lass dreary.
Women become dainty, refined, self possessed rather
than slovenly, ignorant and mute. Even place names
underwent a change. In writing er Mo tain over
Garland admits,

“Just why I changed the names of trails,
towns and valleys I cannot explain...
gzrhaps I resented thecprosaic sound if

oneffles' and hontroae Junction .

Garland was not entirely unsuccessful in his efforts
to acquire taste. Though he unquestionably lost much of
his force and intensity, he managed to achieve a gener~
ally pleasing uniformity of style and diction, and occa-
sionaly a genuine brilliance. His power of natural des-
' cription, though studied and deliberate is often ax-

quisite. Of the mountains, he wrote:

'1. Garland, gaughter of the Middl: Egrdgr, 99.

68

"Snow covered, flaming like burnished mar-
ble, the range aith high summits sharply

’ set against the cloudless sky, upreared in
austere majesty, each bleak crag gilded
with the first rays of the morning sun.
Above the warm brown plain, the giants
towered remotely alien like ancient kings
on purple thrones”. 1 '

He saw a prairie as

n... The tender springing grass, the far-
away faint and changing purple of the
woods the shimmer of the swelling praio
rie, leaping toward the flaming sun —~
all the inexpressable glow and pulse of
blooming spring".

Of London he wrote:

"As we dashed through Surrey, I caught
glimpses of Tudor mansions, thatched
cottages and Norman towers, and longed
to stay to clutch at the beauty spinn-
ing by like a billowing web”. 3

Garland frequently reaches a pinnacle of excell-
ence worthy of the greatest artists in his figurative
expressions. His description of a wheat field is
characteristic:

"Deep as the breat.of a man, wide as the
sea, heavy~headed, supple-stocked, full
of multitudinous, secret, whispered coll-
oquies - a meeting place of winds and

sunlight - our fields ran to the world's
end."

1. Garland, Dau hter of the M ddle Border, 140.

2. Garland, Eov Life on the Prairie, 37.

3. Garland, Back Trailers from the Middle gorder, 185.
4. Garland, Eon o? the Mid Bo er 4 .

 

 

 

 

69

Of news he wrote:

"News makes no noise. It walks with
velvet foot, it speaks in a murmer;
it hastens, but_it conceals in haste”.1

He describes a naive man's visions of ”wild meadows"

' which were

"filled with game and free lands which
needed only to be tickled with the hoe
to laugh into harvest".

0f Bertie in money Mad, who like Garland was struggling

to acquire taste, he wrote:

"She divoured Shakespearean bread, Ibsen
roasts and comic opega cream puffs with
almost equal gusto“. '

Garland very infrequently attempted description of
the abstract but devoted most of his attention to the
concrete and visual. A description of the impression
which the music of Wagner made upon Rose is illustra-

tive of his skill in this area:

”The voice of Wagner came to her for the
first time and shook her and thrilled
her and lifted her into the wonderful
regions where the green trees dripped
golden moss and the grasses were Jew-
elled in the very truth. Wistful young
voices rose above the lazy lap of the
waves, sad with love and burdened with

1. Garland, Ca tain f theugrey Horse Tr , 37.
2. Garland, A son of the Middle Border, 4.
3. Garland, Money magic, 233.

70

beauty which destroyed. Like a deep-
purple cloud death came, slowly, resist-
lessly, closing down on those who sang,
clasped in each other's arms. They lay
dead at last, and up through the hover-
ing cloud their spirits soared like gold
and silver flame, woven together, and
the harsh thunder of the gray sea died
to a sullen boom.”

The stylistic beauty to which Garland occasionaly
rose won him some contemporary recognition as an
artist. It is doubtful, however, that it was compen-

sation enough for the loss of his early promise as a

realist.

I 1. Garland, Rose of putcher's coolly, 235.

v1.
FINAL ESTIKATE

That Garland failed as a realist, and consequently
as a significant artist: is generally agreed. The cir-
c‘mstances of the time and place of his birth placed
him at the very core of the realistic movement. He
matured with it, and his early experiences and utter-
ances identified him with it. The opening struggle
.for realism made a timid beginning in social critiCisn
and it clearly lacked a champion with the courage to
write boldly and frankly and with the penetration to
go beyond the suave satirical analysis of Howells into
a forthright and unvarnished social representation.
Garland might have become such a champion, for his
early works demonstrated his promise. Yet, though he
might have been a charter member and a director in the
movement, the unfortunate fact is that he was only an
over-night visitor who checked out before he became
prominent and before his own powers had a chance to
mature. That he did fail as a realist is an obvious
fact. Why he failed is not so obvious.

The less penetrating and more numerous of the
Garland critics attribute his failure to his own albi-
tion. They label Garland a literary "opportunist”

who turned his back on social criticism for a conteu’

porary reputaticn and financial success. Uncharitable
as the accusation is, it is not without truth. Gar-
land himself admits "my reform noticns were subordin-
ate to my desire to take honors as a novelist" , and
when he perceived that a more genteel literature had ‘

better opportunity for publication and that it met with

p

ess antagonism from his readers, he wrote what his pub-
lishers demanded and catered to what he believed to be
the public's tastes..

A closer examination will reveal that Garland'a
failure as a realist was more fundamental than simple
opportunism, however. It will reveal that Garland
was never a realist in the true sense of the word. It
will bear out that his first association with the move-
ment was one of circumstancial accident, that he never
fully understood realism and that he lacked faith in
what he did understand.

Garland never had the opportunity or the inclin—
ation to completely understand realism. The only mod-
915 he had aere.Fggleston's semi-realistic tales of
familiar scenes and HOwells' discreet and expurgated
analyses of manners. The American realistic movement
was in a tender formitive stage and thOugh the Euro-
pean realists, Goldoni, Valdes,-Galdos, Turgenev,
Tolstoy, Daudet and Zola, were at the full tide of

expression, Garland did not profit by their example.

73

subject and his audience were passing. He repeatedly
expressed his urgency to write of the border, to tell
his stories before the generation which would be in-
terested in his material was gone. He tells of being
hurried by his publishers to produce while there.was
still a market. It was this narrow regionalistic con-
. ception of realism that made Garland provincial.
Garland's limitation stems also from his motiva-
tion for realism, which arose almost entirely from a
personal indignation. The only writing that can be
-terned realistic stemmed not so much from his liter-
ary as from his social convictions based on the in-
Justices which he and his family had endured.T This
identification of his own problems with his material
accounts for the :igor of his early work, Just as it
accounts for the decline of that vigor when Garland.
had succeeded in rising above his environment. Once
he and his family had escaped, his indignation waned.
His forthright and brutal treatment of the frontier:
had resolved into a semi-romantic, reminiscent, al-
most wistful localizations. Loss of intimacy with
the border made him feel that the border no longer
existed - as indeed it did‘nt in the old way. Chang-
ing times brought new problems which were no longer‘

identified with Garland's own. In his later bio-

7¢'

'He was repelled by their frankness, their vitality
and penetration. Convinced that they were immoral
sensationalists, he repudiated their influence be-
fore he understood them or could profit from them.
To Garland, realism vas elementary ”truth—telling"
with discreet reservations.. His passion for "Verie
tism'l- a term which he borroned from the French -
allowed him to produce a series of stories which were
grim and blank in their economic implications but an
eraggerated Puritanical inclination forbade a frank
penetration into personal morals.

Further, Garland mistakenly identified realima
- with regionalism and confused the technique with the
cause. Local color, which should have been his
method, became instead his end. Long before he had
fullv exploited his "border” material, he spent his,
energies finding new areas to develop, new scenes to |
portray. Though he could never entirely avoid making
moral references, his point of concentration was the.
authenticity of background, edited, of course, in'
terms of his own sensitive discretion. This narron
regionalistic interpretation of realism resulted in
a lack of faith in the universality and the perman-
ence of his medium which nas in turn responsible for
his abandonment of the border crusade. Begfelt his

cause too limited, too provincial, and that both his

75

graphy, he is almost reverent of the departed frontier.

"It all lies in the unchanging realm of
the past - this land of my childhood. Its
charm, its strange dominion cannot return
save in the poet's reminiscent dream. No
money, no railway train can take us back
to it. It did not in truth exist - it was
a magical world, born of the vibrant union
of youth and moaning sinds - a union which
can never come again'to you or me, father,
mother, uncle or brother, till the coulee
meadows bloom again unscarred of spade or
plO'o” 1 ‘

Memory and comfortable living softened the harsh,
cruel outlines of his former existence. The ugliness
was gone, its stark reality had disappeared, and only
a Wistful sadness and remembrance of the pain remained.
Viewing the burned out homestead which he had helped
‘ to build in 1881, Garland said,

"It seems an immeasurable distance from me
now and yet it is so near that the thought
brings an illogical feeling of loss. It
,meant so much to me at that time. I hated
it -.and yet, as it was the only shelter

my mother had, I dared not say so. From it
my sister was married, in it she died.
Flimsy as a pine box, it rested on the ridge,
an ugly fungus of the plain. It floated
for a time like a chip on the edge of a
silent land-swell and then it sank as the
village of Ordway had sunk. Nothing on
_the inexorable plain is built to last.
Dozens of other towns, vociferous as ours,
have found the same grave. One can hardly
have found on the award the spot which they
once polluted. This is the genius of the
middle West, confident, ready, boastful,

1. Garland, Daughter of the_§iddle Border, 389.

it is for time only. It is tragic or it
is humorous (according to the observer)
when a people so hopeful and so vigorous
dies out upon our plain as a river loses
itself in the sand. Two thousand miles
and several centuries of time lie between
me and my New York study and the Septem-
ber morning when I first stepped out of
the car upon that plain... It was another
age, another world, Jocund with ignorance
and youth.“ 1

Clearlv he felt that the border had passed and the
cause he once had had vanished With it.‘ He had nothing
left but memories.

A closer examination will bear out not only that
Garland failed to understand realism but that he never
fully endorsed it as a literary medium. He admits

that before he b

\U

gan his lown literary career, his
early lectures were sharply critical of the realists,

particularly of th foreign wri ers. As was previously

w

pointed out, he was repelled and shocked by their frank-
ness. He would have excluded their material from Amer-
-ica. It was not until he read Howells, whom he iden-
tified as a realist, that he took an interest in the
movement. Howells had found that delicate compromise

of social protest and discretion which met with the
approval of Garland's own social convictions and yet

did not injure his sensibilities and standards of

Hood taste. He accepted realism as Howells defined it

and though he was saved from slavish imitation by the

1. Garland, geek-Trailers from the Kiddie Border, 312.

76

77

more rugged material with which he worked, he never
succeeded in advancing the cause of realistic inter~
pretation much beyond the gentlemanly accuracy of his
master. Garland was too sensitive, too squeamish to
be a realist, too fastidious to be shocking.

As Garland's limitation in aesthetic philosophy
was the fundamental cause of his decline, the imme—
diate cause was his insecurity. Fundamentally, he
lacked both the penetration and the persistancy for
the truly artistic personality. He was too much the
extrovert, the social climber, with ambitions that
were more for himself that his art. His prime motiv-
ations were material rather than aesthetic. Immediate-
ly, he was woefully insecure. His background was
humble and offered no material advantage. He had'no
literary stimulation or association, no genuine cli~
mate of opinion. His education was haphazard and
desultory, guided by no more sure opinion than his

0 make his

r?

own choosing. He was forced literally
own way out of his environment. It is easy to under-
stand then why Garland followed every avenue of prom-
ise. He needed associations and he went about getting
them. He became an orator for a cause which would
sponsor him, a champion for a program which would give
him attention. He had to find his own contacts with

publishers to provide outlet for his material, and to

78

establish these contacts, he vas willing to accept
dictation. The success of every artist inspired him
and he eagerly sought out those who were successful in
an effort to gain advice and an insight into their
formulae. By dint of shrewd, practical observation,
careful imitation and emulation, he learned to gain
attention.

He never gained independence however. His finan-
cial position and his artistic reputation remained
very modest. Nagging hirrx alW'ays was the painful a-
ware nes s of his humble origins, which fired him with
a passion to acquire culture. He became a hero-wor-
shipper, an idolater who ha sked in reflected glory.
He presumed only occasionally to be bold, but was
quick to apology and appea.s ement. Learning that to
Five injury vas to invite reprisal, he chose the se-
curity of social and literary refinement. He no long-
er dared to pioneer because he no longer cared to
offend.

Garland's life-long dedication was not entirely
in vain. His deter ination and compromise brought
him much of the distinction he had sought. He had
materially risen above the poverty in which he was
born and had achieved the recognition of his contem-
poraries in the artistic world. His selection for

the Academy was his fizal triumph. It represent d

w

his greatest accomplishment and the end of his career.

79

His contributions to American letter; are not

without merit. His short stories are a lo-u nt

5
\U

’
\II

and powerful addition to the chorus of social pro-

of an era. They are faithful to their times and re-
presentative of the gathering forces in the social-
istic revolt. 'His passion for Local Color aided
materiall? in the literary exploitation of the Amer-
ican scene. His Son of the Middle Border is a gen-
uine accomplishment in the field of autobiography,

a supreme example of the warmth, sincerity and app al
of this literarv method. Vascillating as his at en-
tion mav have been, his will to succeed in spite of
overwhelming odds is inspirational.

Though he did lack the courage and penetratiai
for the independence of effort which makes for leader-
ship and greatness, Garland did succeed in working
himself smugl? into the ranks of the American litere
ary travellers. That he never fulfilled his promise
as a realist is true, but he did adVance the cause

as a sloganeer, and a bill-board artist who adver~

80

BI. L OGRAEflX

The bibliography which follows is
selective rather than exhaustive. It
is limited to those materials which
give an intensive consideration to
Hamlin Garland or the period in whiCh
he flourished. The compendium of Gar-
land's works represents his major con-
tributions and does not include his
many short articles, critical reviews

and oratorical compoSitions.

81

GARLANE'S WORKS

(Arranged Chronologically)

finder the Wheel - A modern play in six scenes.
Boston, 1890.

lain Iravellgd Roads. Boston, 1891.
Nember of the Third House. Chicago, 1892.
A New Qeclaration of Rights. Chicago, 1892.

{ason Edwards, An_Average Man. Boston, 1892.

A Little Norsk: or, 91' Eap's Flaxen, New York,
1 92.

A 329;; g; fong. Boston, 1892.
Prairie Folks. Chicago, 1893.
Erairig Song . Chicago, 1893.

grumbling Idols. Chicago, 1894.
Rose of Butcher's 000111. New York, 1895.

 

Wayside Courts hips. New York, 1897. (Later used
as material for revised edition of Main

Travelled Roads and cher Main Travelled
Roads.)

lesses S. Grant; His Life and Character. New
York, 1898.

e S irit of Sweetaater. Philadelphia, 1893.
(Complete title later published with the
original magazine title "Witch's Gold, "
New York, 1916.)

Ihe Trail of the goldseekers. New York, 1899.

£01 Life on the Prairie. New York 1899. (Rev-
ised edition, New York, 19085

 

 

 

The a 9'2 ear . New York, 1900.
aer Mountain Lover. New York, 1901.

gut of Doorfgmerigags. Philadelphia, 1901.
gggtain of the Grey Horse Troog. New York, 1902.
as e . New York, 1903.
The Light of the Star. Nee York, 1904.
IheeTyrannonf the Dark. New York, 1905.
Ehe Long Trail. New York, 1905.
one a c. New York, 1907.
Ihe Shadow World. New York, 1908.
Ih3_Moccasin Ranch. New York, 1909.
IQ; Grand Canyon of Arizona. (Published by the

Passenger Department of the Santa Fe Hail-
road. Contains: The Grand Canyon at Night

and John Hanqeg A Study. 1909)

Cavanaugh1 Forest Banger. New York, 1910

cher gain Travelled Roads. New York, 1910.

Victor Qllnee's Disciplig_. New York, 1911.

The Forester's Daughter. New York, 1914.

They of the High Trails. New York, 1916.

;_§on of the_giddle Border. New York, 1917.
gimihatteson of Wagon Wheel Gan. Garden City, 1917.

Ihe Graven image; In Prairie Gold. Topeka, Kansas,
917.

A Daughter of the Middle Border. New York, 1921.

 

Commemorative Tribute to James Nhitcomb Riley.
Proceedings of the American Academy, New
York, 1922.

it»

Pioneer Mother. Chicago, 1922.

The Hook of the American Indian. New York, 1923.

83

Irail Makers of the Middle Border. New York, 1926.
gemories of the Middle Border. New York, 1926.

The_Westward March of the American Settlement.
Chicago, 1927.

geek-Trailers from the Niddle_§grder. New York, 1928.
Bgadside geetings. New York, 1930.

Comoanions on the Trail. New York, 1990.

.!1 Friendly Contemporari2_. New York, 1932.

Afternoon Neighbors. New York, 1934.

Long Trail. New York, 1935.

Egrty Years of Psychic Research. New York, 1936.

‘ wa 0 owa! Iowa City, 1935.

The Mystery of the Buried gros es. New York, 1919.

VI)

The Fortunate Exile. (Published posthumously)
New York, 1940. -

84

CRITICAL BIBLIOGRAPHY

Beer, Thongs. The Mauve Decade. New York, Knopf,
19? .

Boynton, Percy H. A History of American Liter-
ature. New York, Ginn, 1919.

-—-— Literature and American Life. New York,

1936.

---- ' The Rediscovery‘of the Frontier. Chicago,
University of Chicago Press, 1931.

Brooks, Van chk. The Times of Melville and Whit-

Calverton, Victor F. The Liberation of Amer can
Literature. New York, Scribners, 1932.

Cambridge History of Agerican Literature. New
York, Macmillan, 1933.

Cargill, Oscar. In+ellectual America. New York,
Macmillan, 1941.

---- The Social Revolt. New York, Macmillan,
933.

---- The Rise of the American Novel. New York,
American Book Co., 1918.

Dondore, Dorothy Anne. The Prairie andAtgg Making
of Middle America. “Eadar Rapids, Iowa,
Torch Press, 1926. PH.D. Thesis.

Flanagan, John Theodore. Agerica~is West. Yinn-
eapolis, Univ. of Ninnesota pr., 1945.

Foerster, Norman. The Reintergretation of Amer—
ican Literature. New York, Harcourt, 1928.
{Edited for M.L.A.

George, Henry. The Condijion of Labor. New York,
U.S. Book 00., 1891.

---~ Perplexed Philosogher. New York, Webster,
1892.

"-- Progress and Poverty. NB? York, Doubleday,
1926.

85

Gronewold, Benjamen F. The Social Criticism of
Hamlin Garland. Unpublished Dissertation,
New York, University, 1943.

Harkins, Edward Francis. Famous Authors. Ath im-
pression. Boston, Page, 1906.

 

Haynes, Fred 8. Third Party Novementr gince the
Civil Var. Iowa City, State Hi9 torical
Eociety, 1916.

Hazard, Lucy L. The Frontier in A-eric an Litera—

~pv~nu--- -0.

ture. New York, Crowell, 192 7.

 

Herrimans, Eva. On Parade! New York, Coward—
McCann, 1929.

Hicks, Granville. The Great Tradition. Net York,
macmillan, 1933.

Proletarian Literature in the United States, an
anthology, edited by Granville Hicks and
others._ New York, International, 1935.

Hicks, John E. The Populist Revolt. Minneapolis,
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Howells, Nilliam D. Criticism and Fiction. New
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p1

 

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