Dirty Words in Deadwood: Literature and the Postwestern MelodyGraulich and Nicolas S.Witschi, Editors. Lincoln, Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press, 2013.

Abstract

Dirty Words in Deadwood: Literature and the Postwestern Melody Graulich and Nicolas S. Witschi, Editors. Lincoln, Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press, 2013.Deadwood, South Dakota, occupies a space both real and imagined in the history of the American West. It was founded illegally as a mining camp during the 1876 gold rush in the Black Hills, which had been granted to the Lakota in the 1868 Treaty of Fort Laramie. Present-day Deadwood, with its well-maintained historical district and prestigious place on the National Register of Historic Places, is far removed from the rough-and-tumble frontier camp of the 1870s. Yet, it is precisely the haunting presence of the Old West and the notoriety of some of its illustrious inhabitants, in particular Calamity Jane and Wild Bill Hickok, that make Deadwood's mythical reality overwhelm it as historical metaphor.The 2004-2006 HBO television series, Deadwood, feeds off the frontier mythology and history surrounding Deadwood but steers clear of the romanticism and patriotic fervor of the classic western. Deadwood is a prime example of a postwestern in the sense that it reassesses and in some ways parodies the generic conventions and restrictions of conventional cinematic and literary western narratives. From the beginning of the series, Deadwood raised eyebrows with graphic depiction of sex and violence. It quickly gained a strong following of viewers attracted to its complex characters, heavy dialogue brimming with profanity and philosophy, and its revision of the conventional frontier narrative.The latest installment in the University of Nebraska Press's Literature and the Postwestern series, Dirty Words in Deadwood, explores the television series not only as cinematic and literary narrative but also offers a well-rounded contextualization of its genesis and colorful creator David Milch. Milch has worked as a teacher, assisted Cleanth Brooks, R. W. B. Lewis, and Robert Penn Warren in writing college textbooks on literature, and published poetry and fiction. But he is best known for his contributions to television and has received several Emmy Awards for his work on Hill Street Blues and NYPD Blue. Dirty Words in Deadwood opens with an interview with Milch by Nathaniel Lewis, the son of R.W. B. Lewis. In response to Lewis's prompts, Milch elaborates on his vision of collective identity-we're all members of one body (15)-and the spectral presence of the past in American literature. …