The unvarnished truth

Description

"The practice of selling one's tale of woe to make a buck has long been a part of American culture. The Unvarnished Truth: Personal Narratives in Nineteenth-Century America is a powerful cultural history of how ordinary Americans crafted and sold their stories of hardship and calamity during the nineteenth century. Ann Fabian examines the tales of beggars, convicts, ex-slaves, prisoners of the Confederacy, and others to explore cultural authority, truth-telling, and the nature of print media as the country was shifting to a market economy. This book describes the controversies surrounding these little-read tales and returns them to the social worlds where they were produced."--BOOK JACKET.

Subjects

Other Editions

• The unvarnished truth: personal narratives in nineteenth-century AmericaUniversity of California Press2000-01-01
• Unvarnished TruthUniversity of California Press2000-01-01
• Unvarnished TruthUniversity of California Press2000-01-01
• The Unvarnished TruthPaperbackUniversity of California Press2002-01-07