Southern Lights and Shadows
Introduction The most noticeable characteristic of the extraordinary literary development of the South since the Civil War is that it is almost entirely in the direction of realism. A people who, up to that time, had been so romantic that they wished to naturalize among themselves the ideals and usages of the Walter Scott ages of chivalry, suddenly dropped all that, and in their search for literary material could apparently find nothing so good as the facts of their native life. The more "commonplace" these facts the better they seemed to like them. Evidently they believed that there was a poetry under the rude outside of their mountaineers, their slattern country wives, their shy rustic men and maids, their grotesque humorists, their wild religionists, even their black freedmen, which was worth more than the poetastery of the romantic fiction of their fathers. In this strong faith, which need not have been a conscious creed, the writers of the New South have given the world sketches and studies and portraits of the persons and conditions of their peculiar civilization which the Russians themselves have not excelled in honesty, and hardly in simplicity. To be sure, this development was on the lines of those early humorists who antedated the romantic fictionists, and who were often in their humor so rank, so wild, so savage, so cruel, but the modern realism has refined both upon their
much satisfaction. The railroad embankment is about one hundred and
fifty yards from the tee, and few try to carry it. The old post road
runs parallel to the line of this hole, and forms the western boundary
of the Woodvale links. There is no bunker save the railroad bank for the
entire distance, and it is an ideal hole for the golf "slugger."
"Where is the green?" asked Harding, standing on the elevated tee. I
pointed in the line of the old church belfry, and after a long look he
declared that he could see the white flag floating from the standard.
"Nobody ever drove it, you say?" he observed, throwing his shoulders
back.
"Of course not," I laughed, and added, "and never will."
"Don't be too sure about that," he said, piling a mound of sand. "It's
nothing more than a 'putt,' as you call it, to bat a ball over that
railroad."
"You talk about driving six hundred yards to that green," I said,
annoyed at his ignorant nerve, "I will bet you a box of cigars that you
do not carry that railroad track in a month."
"Don't be foolish, Smith."
"Do you wish to bet?"
Introduction The most noticeable characteristic of the extraordinary literary development of the South since the Civil War is that it is almost entirely in the direction of realism. A people who, up to that time, had been so romantic that they wished to naturalize among themselves the ideals and usages of the Walter Scott ages of chivalry, suddenly dropped all that, and in their search for literary material could apparently find nothing so good as the facts of their native life. The more "commonplace" these facts the better they seemed to like them. Evidently they believed that there was a poetry under the rude outside of their mountaineers, their slattern country wives, their shy rustic men and maids, their grotesque humorists, their wild religionists, even their black freedmen, which was worth more than the poetastery of the romantic fiction of their fathers. In this strong faith, which need not have been a conscious creed, the writers of the New South have given the world sketches and studies and portraits of the persons and conditions of their peculiar civilization which the Russians themselves have not excelled in honesty, and hardly in simplicity. To be sure, this development was on the lines of those early humorists who antedated the romantic fictionists, and who were often in their humor so rank, so wild, so savage, so cruel, but the modern realism has refined both upon their