The Shadow Riders | Literary Precedents

The Shadow Riders Literary Precedents

Fiction on the corruption following the Civil War abounds. It ranges in quality from Margaret Mitchell's extraordinarily popular Gone with the Wind (1936) to Faulkner's portraits of the Compson, Sartoris, Snopes, Stevens, and Sutpen clans in his short stories and novels. L'Amour's fiction does not reach the level of Margaret Mitchell's nor even approach that of Faulkner in intellectual depth, emotional power, and artistry. There are, nevertheless, similarities. All are interested in families, the relationships between their members, and depiction of the postwar South. All depict the mixture of races and nationalities — whites, blacks and Hispanics — both in friendship and hatred. All value those who exhibit courage, who endure and who fight the battle of good over evil. All emphasize the importance of the land and the strength that it gives to those who possess it.