Title: Transcending Tradition: A Political Reading of Ellen Glasgow’s The Battle-Ground

Abstract: Ellen Glasgow’s The Battle-Ground came out in the early 20th century, when American southern society experienced significant post-Reconstruction social transition and plantation romance led the literary trend among postbellum southern writers. In response to the features and embedded ideologies of that literary tradition, this paper intends to conduct a political reading of the novel in terms of race, class and gender, revealing the author’s disobedience of tradition. By means of employing realism against romanticism, Glasgow transcended the frame of plantation romance tradition and expressed her political vision for the new south. Through her realistic depiction of American southern society, Glasgow has been hailed as a pioneer of literary realism in American south at the turn of the 20th century.

Keywords: Ellen Glasgow, The Battle-Ground, plantation romance, transcending

Author: Yan Zeng, Ph.D. candidate, School of English and International Studies, Beijing Foreign Studies University, Beijing, China.