Ambrose Bierce's Civilians and Soldiers in Context: A Critical StudyAmbrose Bierce's In the Midst of Life, the second volume of The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, is hailed by critics and scholars alike as his most important literary work. In Ambrose Bierce's Civilians and Soldiers in Context: A Critical Study, Donald T. Blume refutes this and instead identifies Bierce's original 1892 collection as his most definitive and authoritative work. The two subsequent collections, appearing in 1898 and 1909, although containing subtle clues pointing back to the importance of the 1892 collection, are in their primary effect literary red herrings. This new study reveals that the nineteen stories that comprised the original Tales of Soldiers and Civilians consist of carefully developed and interrelated meanings and themes that can only be fully understood by examining the complex circumstances of their original productions. By considering each of the nineteen tales in the order in which they were first published and by drawing heavily on contemporary related materials, Blume re-creates much of the original milieu into which Bierce carefully placed his short stories. Blume systematically examines many of Bierce's editing flaws, exposing that Bierce's decisions often weakened the original literary merits of his stories. Ultimately this story reveals, tale by tale and layer by layer, that the nineteen stories included in Bierce's 1892 collection were masterpieces of fiction, destined to become classics. Historians and Civil War enthusiasts, as well as literary scholars, will welcome this new study. |
From inside the book
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... revised and ordered for republication . The first step in this search for understanding is to consider how the stories fit into Bierce's career as a professional writer . In particular , while all of Bierce's " Soldiers " stories owe an ...
... revised and expanded collection of Bierce's " Soldiers " and " Civilians " sto- ries , In the Midst of Life : Tales of Soldiers and Civilians , bringing the revised volume with its twenty - two stories , and the literary talents of the ...
... revisions of individual stories inevitably resulted in improvements , and by his suggestions that Hearst's editors and typesetters had mangled his work , schol- ars have generally considered Bierce's revisions of earlier writings to be ...
... revision work , which was conducted nearly a decade after the original creative act , in addition to removing minor typographical errors and stylistic weaknesses , Bierce problematically pared down two key passages and made several ...
... revised versions , readers are likely to rush through the paragraph without such a pregnant pause.12 Pick- ing up the thread of the story , in the same paragraph's concluding lines Doman finds temporary respite in quiet laughter and in ...
Contents
1 | |
34 | |
Killed at Resaca | 64 |
One of the Missing | 83 |
A Son of the Gods | 99 |
A Tough Tussle | 114 |
Chickamauga | 124 |
The Horseman in the Sky | 145 |
The Watcher by the Dead | 193 |
The Man and the Snake | 203 |
An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge | 211 |
The Middle Toe of the Right Foot | 244 |
Haïta the Shepherd | 259 |
James Adderson Philosopher and Wit | 276 |
An Heiress from Redhorse | 302 |
The Boarded Window | 315 |
The Coup de Grâce | 161 |
The Suitable Surroundings | 179 |
The Affair at Coulters Notch | 185 |
The Collections | 329 |