SOURCE: "Hamlin Garland and Reform," in The South Dakota Review, Vol. 10, No. 4, Winter, 1972-73, pp. 36-62.

In the following excerpt, Saum reviews the various reform movements that Garland promoted in his short stories and asserts that, despite his consideration of society's ills in his early works, Garland was initially optimistic regarding human potential. The critic also proposes that Garland's eventual rejection of fictional protest resulted from a waning of his optimism and the growing opposition to literary realism at the turn of the century.

Hamlin Garland's writing of the 1890's foreshadowed various of the twentieth century reform activities and persuasions. Far too commonly he has been seen as having a monistic focus on Midwestern farm life. This essay will attempt to indicate first that he gave literary treatment to a multiplicity of reform urges, among which agrarianism may not have been even the most prominent. Secondly, the essay...