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From the patricians of the early republic to post-Reconstruction racial scientists, from fin de siècle progressivist social reformers to post-war sociologists, character, that curiously formable yet equally formidable “stuff,” has had a long and checkered history giving shape to the American national identity.Bodies of Reform reconceives this pivotal category of nineteenth-century literature and culture by charting the development of the concept of “character” in the fictional genres, social reform movements, and political cultures of the United States from the mid-nineteenth to the early-twentieth century. By reading novelists such as Herman Melville, Mark Twain, Pauline Hopkins, and Charlotte Perkins Gilman alongside a diverse collection of texts concerned with the mission of building character, including child-rearing guides, muscle-building magazines, libel and naturalization law, Scout handbooks, and success manuals, James B. Salazar uncovers how the cultural practices of representing character operated in tandem with the character-building strategies of social reformers. His innovative reading of this archive offers a radical revision of this defining category in U.S. literature and culture, arguing that character was the keystone of a cultural politics of embodiment, a politics that played a critical role in determining-and contesting-the social mobility, political authority, and cultural meaning of the raced and gendered body.

Politics and literature --- Political culture --- Rhetoric --- Character --- National characteristics, American, in literature. --- Characters and characteristics in literature. --- Character in literature. --- American fiction --- Language and languages --- Speaking --- Authorship --- Expression --- Literary style --- Ethology --- Ethics --- Personality --- Character sketches --- Characterization (Literature) --- Literary characters --- Literary portraits --- Portraits, Literary --- History --- Political aspects --- History and criticism. --- History and criticism --- 19th century --- Characters and characteristics in literature --- National characteristics [American ] in literature --- United States --- Twain, Mark --- Characters --- Gilman, Charlotte Perkins --- Criticism and interpretation --- Hopkins, Pauline Elizabeth --- Addams, Jane --- Bodies. --- States. --- United. --- category. --- century. --- character. --- charting. --- concept. --- culture. --- cultures. --- development. --- early-twentieth. --- fictional. --- from. --- genres. --- literature. --- mid-nineteenth. --- movements. --- nineteenth-century. --- pivotal. --- political. --- reconceives. --- reform. --- social. --- this.