Skip to main content

Guest Post by Jeffrey Statyon: Sherman's March (and the Women Who Won't Let Him Forget It)

     Today's guest author is Jeffrey Stayton. He is a professor of Southern and African American literature. He published his first book, This Side of the River two days ago, which I have just recently reviewed. It is about a group of angry Confederate widows that band together, take up arms, and march north to destroy General Sherman's house. In this guest post, he talks about Sherman's march and the women who were affected by it. I hope this guest post will give you some insight into his work. Thank you, Mr. Stayton.



Sherman’s March (and the Women Who Won’t Let Him Forget It)

     Years ago I gave a scholarly paper in Rome, Georgia, about the plantation mistresses who kept diaries and journals during Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman’s March to the Sea. It wasn’t a bad paper, though I knew I wouldn’t turn it into an article. It was well-received, especially since it dealt with some of the source material that Margaret Mitchell used for her Civil War epic, Gone With the Wind. I did not know that this paper would become a passport into what would eventually be my own Civil War odyssey, This Side of the River.

     Whenever I teach Southern literature, I do my best to have a cross-section of perspectives so that it is not a single dominant view of “the South.” And while there are plenty of amazing Civil War materials written by men, I found that teaching one of these journals, such as Eliza Andrews’s War-Time Journal of a Georgia Girl, was very instructive. I suppose what has always struck me is how the myth of the Southern Rebel girl is so much a part of our Civil War literature, Scarlett O’Hara merely being the most famous. Oftentimes, when my students read such journals, they are amazed at the willful blindness these women (many of whom were quite intelligent and capable) would exhibit. They might recognize that Union prisoners at Andersonville were treated in ways that would foreshadow the Holocaust in the next century, yet they would still cling to the “Lost Cause” and deflect blame on the Union itself.

     This seems to be at the heart of the matter to me with my novel. I have always been fascinated and horrified whenever many of my friends, who have been brilliant, capable and successful women, nevertheless attached themselves all too often with weak and even awful (or brutal) men as their lovers, husbands and fathers of their sad children. Moreover, Southern women are unfortunately actively acting against their own political interests—all in the name of the patriarchy that will promise protection but usually deliver second-class status. So it is my hope that these fictional war widows in my novel are all too human because of this. I’ve grown tired in both fiction and film reading and viewing super heroines who might be able to highkick villains in heels, but then are little better than another Charlie’s “angel” when all is said and done. The clarion call is always for more “strong female characters,” but we continue to define strength in terms that favor men. Which is why I was more interested following the journey of these specific women, warts and all, rather than create two-dimensional warrior women that resemble video game characters instead of flesh and bone humans. I did not seek out to write “herstory” anymore than history; I was more interested in story. That is where the life of your characters resides.  

Also be sure to check out my review of Jeffrey Statyon's novel:  

This Side of The River.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

The Rose Code by Kate Quinn: A Book Review

The Rose Code Author: Kate Quinn Genre: Historical Fiction Publisher: Harper Collins Release Date: 2021 Pages: 635 Source: Netgalley/Publisher in exchange for an honest review. Synopsis: 1940, Bletchley Park, Buckinghamshire.        Three very different women are recruited to the mysterious Bletchley Park, where the best minds in Britain train to break German military codes.       Vivacious debutante Osla has the dashing Prince Philip of Greece sending her roses – but she burns to prove herself as more than a society girl, working to translate decoded enemy secrets. Self-made Mab masters the legendary codebreaking machines as she conceals old wounds and the poverty of her East-End London upbringing. And shy local girl Beth is the outsider who trains as one of the Park’s few female cryptanalysts.       1947, London.        Seven years after they first meet, on the eve of the royal wedding between Princess Elizabeth and Prince Philip, disaster threatens. Osla, Mab and Beth are estranged,

The Magnificent Lives of Marjorie Post by Allison Pataki: A Book Review

The Magnificent Lives of Marjorie Post Author: Allison Pataki Genre: Historical Fiction Publisher: Ballantine Release Date: February 15, 2022 Pages: 381 Source: Netgalley/Publisher in exchange for an honest review. Synopsis: Mrs. Post, the President and First Lady are here to see you. . . . So begins another average evening for Marjorie Merriweather Post. Presidents have come and gone, but she has hosted them all. Growing up in the modest farmlands of Battle Creek, Michigan, Marjorie was inspired by a few simple rules: always think for yourself, never take success for granted, and work hard—even when deemed American royalty, even while covered in imperial diamonds. Marjorie had an insatiable drive to live and love and to give more than she got. From crawling through Moscow warehouses to rescue the Tsar’s treasures to outrunning the Nazis in London, from serving the homeless of the Great Depression to entertaining Roosevelts, Kennedys, and Hollywood’s biggest stars, Marjorie Merriweath

The Seven Sisters (The Seven Sisters #1) by Lucinda Riley: A Book Review

The Seven Sisters (The Seven Sisters #1) Author: Lucinda Riley Genre: Historical Fiction, Romance Publisher: Atria Release Date: 2015 Pages: 463 Source: My State Public Library Synopsis: Maia D’Apliese and her five sisters gather together at their childhood home, “Atlantis”—a fabulous, secluded castle situated on the shores of Lake Geneva—having been told that their beloved father, who adopted them all as babies, has died. Each of them is handed a tantalizing clue to her true heritage—a clue which takes Maia across the world to a crumbling mansion in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Once there, she begins to put together the pieces of her story and its beginnings. Eighty years earlier in Rio’s Belle Epoque of the 1920s, Izabela Bonifacio’s father has aspirations for his daughter to marry into the aristocracy. Meanwhile, architect Heitor da Silva Costa is devising plans for an enormous statue, to be called Christ the Redeemer, and will soon travel to Paris to find the right sculptor to