"Desirable Immigrants": The Assimilation of Transplanted Yankees in Page and Tourgee

Abstract

This paper examines the literary representation of Yankees who have moved to the South in two novels: Albion Tourg�e A Fool's Errand (1879) and Thomas Nelson Page's Red Rock (1898). Tourg�e was a northern liberal, and Page was a southern conservative, yet both novelists depict Yankees who successfully integrate into southern culture. The similarities between Page's and Tourg�e's constructions of the assimilated Yankee suggest a shared ideology that transcends any sectional differences over Reconstruction. Their novels reflect the ambivalence felt by many late nineteenth-century Americans about the massive influx of foreign immigrants. As they attempt to define the "desirable" immigrant, Page and Tourg�e contribute to the consolidation of a racial ideology that would structure the American imperialist agenda of the early twentieth century.