University of Massachusetts Press Literature and Criminal Justice in Antebellum America

Review [W]hile Ostrowski looks to intervene in a critical narrative about the racial politics of reform, what he offers instead is a crucial history of print culture's role in the messy, often muddled, but utterly inextricable relationship between race and criminal justice in America. In this sense, Literature and Criminal Justice in Antebellum America presents an indispensable archive for the age of mass incarceration -- one that allows us to appreciate fully the contradictions of the US's carceral regime and the literature devoted to it.--American Literary HistoryOstrowski's provocative claims about the centrality of carceral conversion narratives for the development of psychological interiority in American literature and about the role of vigilantism in the development of African American civil agency are well worth the read. Highly recommended.-- (01/01/0001)The strength of Literature and Criminal Justice in Antebellum America lies in its combination of engaging, accessible prose and an impressive breadth of source material. Ostrowski deftly demonstrates how, across multiple print venues, stories of prison and criminality were 'endorsed, adapted, modified, or challenged' to suit an array of 'political views, artistic choices, reform impulses, and commercial imperatives of individual authors, editors, and publishers.'--American Periodicals Product Description Rethinking American literature through the lens of criminal narratives About the Author Carl Ostrowski is professor of English at Middle Tennessee State University and author of Books, Maps, and Politics: A Cultural History of the Library of Congress, 1783-1861 (University of Massachusetts Press, 2004).