William Gardner Smith, Last of the Conquerors

Alexa Weik von Mossner (Universität Klagenfurt)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 3.2.4: American (US) Writing and Culture: Postwar and Contemporary, 1945-present.
Vol. editors: Sofia Ahlberg (Uppsala University), Patrick Chura (University of Akron), Emory Elliott (University of California, Riverside), Dale Enggass (University of Utah), Christopher Hugh Gair (University of Glasgow), Matthew Hofer (University of New Mexico), Stephen E. Meats (Pittsburg State University), Kerry Myler (Birmingham Newman University), Justin Parks (UiT - The Arctic University of Norway), Nick Selby (University of East Anglia)

Dates

First circulation or publication 1948

Places

United States (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Novel

Resources

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William Gardner Smith’s debut novel

Last of the Conquerors

was published by Farrar, Straus and Company in 1948. Smith began writing the novel in 1947, on the return trip from his duty with the US occupation forces in Germany. There, he had served for eight months as a clerk-typist with the 661st Truck Company in Berlin.

Last of the Conquerors

is a courageous book that does not shy away from depicting the situation in the segregated U.S. army as Smith himself experienced it. In the novel, he skilfully combines the love story between a black American soldier and a white German woman with a celebration of human sameness and a scathing critique of racism in the US army and America as a whole. He contrasts the latter quite effectively with the warm welcome and friendly acceptance that the…

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1402 words

Citation: Weik von Mossner, Alexa. "Last of the Conquerors". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 19 August 2009 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=26238, accessed 27 November 2024.]

William Gardner Smith, Last of the Conquerors

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