So Red the Rose

by Stark Young

Book Overview

Young's novel of war coming to the Natchez region of Mississippi has long been considered one of the best of Civil War novels. "If you would understand what was best in the Old South, its attitude toward life, you will find them here, glowing with that same vitality which was theirs in life."-New York Times. Southern Classics Series.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1879941120
• ISBN13: 9781879941120
• Release Date: September 1992
• Publisher: Globe Pequot Publishing Group Inc/Bloomsbury
• Length: 452 Pages
• Weight: 1.15 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 8.5" x 5.5"

Customer Reviews

How True the Fiction

A most enjoyable, fictional, historical account of life in the South during and after the Civil War. Enough truth to make it very believable and the author's descriptive terminology places you in with the characters so that you become very involved with the story personally. A lot of history is learned about Civil War military blunders that certainly effected the outcome of the war. I can understand why they made a movie of this book. It would be a good one to bring back as TV miniseries.

Very engaging look into the culture of the antebellum South.

"So Red the Rose" is a very engaging tale that affords the reader an insight into the culture and attitudes of the antebellum South that became the Confederacy. However, my fellow McGehee descendants (the author was a cousin of actual McGehees in Mississippi) need to bear in mind as they read that this is a NOVEL, not a genealogical register or an entirely true family history.

Classic Civil War novel from the Southern point of view

So Red the Rose is a classic fictional account of the Civil War years from the Southern point of view by one of the leading writers of the so-called Southern Renaissance of the first half of the 20th Century. Stark Young grew up among the kind of people with whom he populates his novel, and his novel focuses on what he called "the life of the affections." So Red the Rose was a best-seller in he 1930's and was made into a movie. Its popularity was eclipsed a few years after its publication by Gone With the Wind. Some critics consider So Red the Rose a better book.The novel describes a Mississippi family and how they were affected by the war. I found the book deeply moving and engrossing; although I live in a different century, live in a different part of the country than the characters, and hold a different set of values in regard to race, I found myself understanding them, relating to them, and liking them.