There are misnomers about pre- and post-Civil war era American life and literature. Not all Americans were happy about the war and once the war was over, bigotry did not turn off like a spigot and servitude likewise was a hard thing to shake. There was no sudden happy endings for Americans of any color, in real life or in literature-- instead this was a time of difficult beginnings. Contemporary writers of that time followed in the footprint of the war -- during pre-Civil war times, the all-pervasive topic to write about was war and its subtopics--tension, loss and ongoing repression. In the Realism-Regionalism post-Civil War era of writing, writers transitioned to articulating the many aspects of America's reconstruction which included new types of struggles by both blacks and whites -- these struggles emerging as unintended consequences of freedom. Reading closely from the work of writers of these two eras, a reader can find unexpected truths which are rich with history and laced with subtlety, ambiguity and irony.
Texts:
In My Contraband (1863) by Louisa May Alcott and Beat Beat Drums (1867) by Walt Whitman, life during the Civil War is well-described. In My Contraband, Alcott writes of being locked up in a room with a contraband former slave and his hated, dying half-brother. Beat Beat Drums poetically tells the reader war comes for everyone--no matter your station, business or beliefs, there is no immunity from war and its fallout.
Transitioning to post-war topics, "The Goophered Grapevine" and "Dave's Neckliss" (1899) by Charles Chestnutt. Chestnutt shows how white Americans still held onto their belief system that owning property and having cheap labor is the most natural arrangement of all and how whites continued to believe they were superior to blacks.
Other Sources:
Revising
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