The Passing of the Frontier: A Chronicle of the Old West

Emerson HoughYale University Press1918

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Chapters: 9
Series: The Chronicles of America Series

Summary

This book is a volume in The Chronicles of America Series published by Yale University Press. It was first published in 1918. Its author, Emerson Hough (1857–1923), was an American writer and journalist of the West who spent long periods traveling and reporting there. In an essayistic narrative the book reviews the rise and fall of the American frontier in the nineteenth century, treating the frontier both as a spirit and a way of life and as a historical phase gradually swallowed up by railroads, law, and settled agriculture. Beginning with "the place of the frontier in American history," the author goes on to describe in turn the formation of the prairie ranches and grazing country, the cattle trails that drove herds north to market, the labor and life of the cowboy, the gold rushes of the western mining districts, the roads and transport that crossed the West, the wars with the Indians, and the rise of the great cattlemen, and finally how the advance of the homesteader and the Homestead Act utterly transformed the West. Not content to list events, the author is more concerned with the character of frontier people, the formation of social order, and the melancholy brought by "the passing of the frontier." The book is short (about 180 pages in its first edition) and includes a bibliographical note; it serves well as an introduction to the narrative tradition of American western history.

Editor's review

把“西部”当作一个正在消失的世界来写，是这本书最动人之处。霍夫本人长年混迹于西部，写牛仔和牛道时带着现场感，写“边疆消逝”时又带着挽歌的调子，介于历史叙述与文学随笔之间。作为“美国编年史丛书”的一册，它有总体史观的框架，篇幅却控制在一百多页，读者不必畏惧庞杂的注疏。需要提醒的是，本书成于1918年，对印第安人的叙述带有明显的时代偏见与“文明征服”口吻，今天读来应保持批判眼光；它的价值正在于让我们看到20世纪初美国人如何讲述自己的西部神话。原书为英文，国内读者多通过公版电子书或英文影印本、英文合集获得，适合作为美国史与西部文学的对照阅读材料。

Who it's for

A good fit for

对美国西部史、边疆神话感兴趣的普通读者
想通过第一手时代文本了解美国历史叙事的读者
阅读英文原著、希望找短篇历史读物练手的读者
研究西部文学与“边疆消逝”主题的学生和爱好者

Not a good fit for

希望看到严谨现代学术考订与注释的史学专业读者
对1910年代种族主义、殖民视角表述敏感且不愿辨析的读者
期待小说式情节与人物故事的读者

Reading tips

先读特纳（F. J. Turner）的“边疆学说”要点，再回看本书第一章，更容易理解作者的立意。
把第九章“自耕农”与前面牧牛、采矿的部分对照读，能看清西部开发的不同阶段如何叠加。
遇到对印第安人的评价性语句时，可标注出来，配合现代印第安史著作做批判性阅读。
全书篇幅短，适合一次通读，再回头精读“牛仔”与“赶牛小道”两章体会其文学笔法。

About the publisher

Yale University Press

Public information on Yale University Press in our database is limited, and the existing entries mainly reflect its publishing focus on history and biography. The collection contains 15 titles covering chronicles of aboriginal America, the founding of the United States, the War of Independence, the Fathers of the Constitution, the age of invention, inland commerce, the Quaker colonies, and organized labor, mostly presented as chronicles and thematic histories. Representative authors include Ellsworth Huntington, Thomas R. Martin, Max Farrand, and Holland Thompson. Common categories involve world history, historical figures, and economics, with an overall emphasis on rigorous historical source work and narrative history writing.

Chapter I The Frontier in History
Chapter II The Ranch
Chapter III The Cattle Trail
Chapter IV The Cowboy
Chapter V The Mining Camp
Chapter VI The Western Road
Chapter VII The Indian Wars
Chapter VIII The Cattleman
Chapter IX The Homesteader

FAQ

这本书是小说吗？

不是。它是历史叙述性的散文，属于“美国编年史丛书”中的一册，讲述19世纪美国西部边疆的开拓与消逝过程，虽然文笔有文学性，但不虚构人物和情节。

有没有中文译本？

据可查资料，本书未见通行的大陆中文译本，中文读者多通过英文原版、公版电子书或英文名著合集阅读。相关版本信息请以实际出版物为准。

这本书在丛书里是第几册？

它属于耶鲁大学出版社1918年出版的The Chronicles of America Series，通常被列为第26卷。丛书由Allen Johnson主编，另有多种重印本行世。

原书有多少页？

1918年耶鲁大学出版社初版为x加181页，含插图与一幅折叠地图，并附参考书目说明（约第175—178页）。后世重印本页数不一。

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About the author

Emerson Hough Author

Emerson Hough is a writer whose work centers on the history of the American West. Public information about him in Chinese is currently limited, and basic details such as his dates of birth and death and his nationality are not clearly recorded in our database. The database includes one work by him, The Passing of the Frontier: A Chronicle of the Old West, a book about the closing of the American frontier and the era of the Old West, classified under history and world history. Judging from this representative work, Hough focuses on the end of the westward expansion, and he is good at tracing frontier changes in a chronicle-like manner, combining historical context with the atmosphere of the times. His writing is aimed at general readers, emphasizing narrative coherence and readability, and offers an accessible introductory perspective for understanding the history of the American West.