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Opie Percival Read
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An Arkansas Planter Kindle Edition

by Opie Percival Read (Author) Format: Kindle Edition
4.1 4.1 out of 5 stars 11 ratings
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"An Arkansas Planter" by Opie Percival Read focuses on domestics and politics in the post-Civil War reconstruction south. The Major believes he has his household strictly under control. He adores his wife and his two children Tom and Louise, and he feels that he knows what is best for them. His family, however, has their own ideas, many of which are not compatible with what the major sees for their future. His daughter runs off, his son is romantically interested in someone unorthodox, and life seems to fall apart, no matter how much control our hero thinks he has.
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  1. Print length
    107 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Sticky notes
    On Kindle Scribe
  4. Publisher
    Good Press
  5. Publication date
    December 19, 2019
  6. File size
    1131 KB
  7. Page Flip
    Enabled
  8. Word Wise
    Enabled
  9. Enhanced typesetting
    Enabled
  10. See all details
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Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B082YCKV5L
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Good Press (December 19, 2019)
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ December 19, 2019
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • File size ‏ : ‎ 1131 KB
  • Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
  • Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
  • Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Sticky notes ‏ : ‎ On Kindle Scribe
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 107 pages
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.1 4.1 out of 5 stars 11 ratings

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Opie Percival Read

Opie Percival Read

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Customer reviews

4.1 out of 5 stars
4.1 out of 5
11 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Kindle Customer
5.0 out of 5 stars a good read
Reviewed in the United States on November 21, 2009
Verified Purchase
I enjoyed this book of post civil war south,the male charaters are very well drawn but female characters are somewhat fuzzy. The most interesting view of white/black racial attitudes I've read and not so different from those of today. Read this one, I've just ordered 2 more free ones by this author as I find his writing very interesting and straight forward. There are some typos in the book but they aren't so bad that they interfere with the reading.
8 people found this helpful
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4.0 out of 5 stars Domestics and Politics in the Post - reconstruction South
Reviewed in the United States on September 25, 2020
Verified Purchase
The Major believes he has his household strictly under control. He adores his wife and his two children Tom and Louise, and he feels that he knows what is best for them. His family, however, has their own ideas, many of which are not compatible with what the major sees for their future. When Louise runs off and gets married, the major is sure that he'll never speak to her again. But the major is softer on the inside than on the outside. He is soon groveling for his daughter's forgiveness even as she determines to make her own way. Meanwhile Tom has his own romantic inclinations, Big Jim remains in love with Louise, and their mother serenely preserveres through the chaos, a rock for them all. Such is domestic life in this era, a time when as many things are changing as are staying the same. That is as true for politics, as race relations remain tense in this area. The major speaks candidly to many of his friends, fearing further loss of power and respect for themselves. On top of the gender and racial inequalities, the author also highlights economic differences between neighbors. It is a book filled with the realities of its time, and deals quite honestly with them all as uncomfortable as that may be.

This book mulls over a lot of big topics, and approaches them with surprising neutrality. Consistently I felt I was left to draw my own conclusions in each squabble, whether domestic, commercial, or military. An Arkansas Planter represents truthfully a time and place in American history for better or for worse. Detailed in most of the telling, I was a bit surprised at how loosely the ending was handled.
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James Ellsworth
5.0 out of 5 stars Major Southern Writer/Humorist Looks at Post Reconstruction Era
Reviewed in the United States on April 15, 2013
Opie Percival Read (born in Nashville, Tennessee in 1852,) is an important Southern writer who edited newspapers, including the important Little Rock paper, the Arkansas Gazette. His keen observation of people and social mores in southern Arkansas led to his writing 'An Arkansas Planter', a major work singled out by the Gutenberg Project and available on Kindle. Academic reviewers feel he accurately captures the modes of expression (lyrical circumlocution and eloquence)typical of an educated Southerner of the day.

'An Arkansas Planter' was published in 1896 and it is set in the post-Reconstruction era, when Southern legislatures were not dominated by newly-enfranchised African-Americans. Read was a Southerner of his own time but the views his most important characters express are family and community-centered and Liberal (as expressed in Rousseau, John Locke and Thomas Jefferson.) In this novel, the Arkansas Planter is 'The Major,' a Harvard-educated owner of 1000 acres of cotton land whose family gave its name to the surrounding county. He runs a household and a business with a bluff but sympathetic view and with 'malice toward none.'

The Major is aided by a loving but church-oriented wife of firm convictions and he is comforted by a long-time boon companion and 'loveable scoundrel' named Gideon (Gid for most of the story.) He loves his two children--a strong-minded daughter with 'modern' and independent ideas and a son who flunked out of Harvard and has yet to find something to be good at. Other well-drawn characters enter into the story as required. The land itself takes on the quality of being a character at times and its topography, vegetation and colors are often invoked with lyrical affection.

This is a novel with a great deal in it: The Major and Gid provide the basis for much humorous camaraderie as well as for passages of homespun and even scholastic philosophy. There are serious and accurate discussions of the relations between 'white' and 'negro' neighbours; between planter and highland white folk. The views of the time and place about religious differences between Protestant and Catholic confessions are given a sympathetic explanation. In fact, there is nothing about this book that is 'mean spirited.' As if that were not enough, Read fills out his pages with a subplot of Christian Love versus the love between husband and wife-to-be and throws in a local insurrection fomented by 'outside agitators' over Labor issues.
So, the reader drops in on family evenings, confabs and joshing among menfolk, follows the course of true love or pulses with the pace of an unfolding crisis that leads to bloodshed. How will it ultimately affect the county?

This is a wonderful book and we must be thankful to electronic publishing as the only way to keep important (once favourite) works of American literature available to any and all who might be interested.
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