jsburbidge: (Default)
jsburbidge ([personal profile] jsburbidge) wrote 2018-10-02 08:19 pm (UTC)

Cabell's southern identity is an odd issue. Cabell intensely identified as a Virginian - he spent a lot of time doing genealogy for the local historical societies - but his literary affiliations (actual friendships - if we count influence we have to consider Faulkner, who was apparently influenced by Cabell, but not one of his circle as such) are more with northern writers such as Lewis and Hergesheimer, and his attitude towards Virginia's is that they simply ignore literary work. It would be wildly improbable if he didn't share the characteristic views of his time and class on race, but I'm having trouble thinking of places where anything reflecting those views comes through in his writing.

One can point to influences on Cabell, mainly French, which serve to situate him in a literary sense; I can't think of any context for Eddison, or at least for The Worm Ouroboros other than Homer (there are some mystical and poetic roots for the following trilogy, including Baudelaire). They're both in full revolt against realism, though, as is their contemporary David Lindsay. (And possibly Mirrlees as a fourth, though aside from Lud-in-the-Mist Mirrlees' affinities are with International Modernism and, later, the Catholic literary revival of the period, in her poetry.)


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