From Warm Center to Ragged Edge: The Erosion of Midwestern Literary and Historical Regionalism, 1920–1965 By Jon K. Lauck

Abstract

In From Warm Center to Ragged Edge, Jon K. Lauck posits that early twentieth-century midwestern literature negatively affected the region’s image. Since at least 2013, upon the founding of the Midwest History Working Group, Lauck has been a tireless advocate for Midwest Studies, and this is his second book for the University of Iowa Press series “Iowa and the Midwest Experience.” In it, he addresses a wide range of midwestern literary and historical figures, including Indiana University historians John D. Barnhart and R. Carlyle Buley, as well as Indiana authors Booth Tarkington, Scott Russell Sanders, Michael Martone, and “the Hoosier Poet,” James Whitcomb Riley.