Prologue "a national factor of no little importance" -- The Holland era, 1870-1881. "Money did it": Scribner's monthly and the incorporation of culture -- The ladies who launch : Scribner's "scribbling" women and the making of a best-selling magazine -- Discovering (southern) regionalism : Scribner's monthly and the making of modern nationhood -- The Gilder era, 1881-1909. Modern instances : vanishing women writers and the rise of realism -- Preserving America : the controversial texts -- "Dey's mightily in de grass": reconstructing the new North in the plantation myth fiction of The century -- Reading the war of The century -- Epilogue : toward the end of The century.
