The Premodern Midwest

Chapter 2 focuses on Illinois, Masters’s home state and the location of the fictional Spoon River. Geographic, economic, and political factors in the early nineteenth century, as well as the growth of Chicago, the Civil War, and the rise of Populism, shaped the state and the region. Likewise, a pioneering mythology molded Midwesterners’ earliest conceptions of themselves, as well as authors like E. W. Howe, who presented grim portrayals of Midwestern life. In adulthood, Masters recalled two towns form his youth, Petersburg, which he remembered nostalgically for its easy-going “Virginian” ways, and Lewistown, which he claimed reflected America’s hypocritical “Calvinism.” These conflicting memories shaped Spoon River Anthology.