Judd Rankin’s Daughter (1945), published in England under the title The Prodigal Giver, is the last and the shortest of the nine novels written and published by Susan Glaspell during her lifetime. The novel is a revealing cultural document of the United States during the Second World War. Set in New York City, in Iowa, and on Cape Cod, the novel focuses on the mother of a young man sent to fight in the Pacific theater and on the adjustments her family must make after her son returns home under psychiatric care for combat stress. It shares many of themes of Glaspell’s larger body of work: what it means to be an American, how cultural identities differ in the Midwest and Northeast of the U.S., how ideals both shape …
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Citation: Winetsky, Michael. "Judd Rankin's Daughter". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 15 August 2014 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=16013, accessed 25 November 2024.]