When Edna Ferber’s Giant was published in 1952, Texans were not pleased. Ferber’s sweeping novel about cattle, oil, and the winds of change brought a reform-minded Virginia woman, Leslie Benedict, to a Texas ranch, where she has the temerity to suggest that the denizens might treat their nonwhite, non-male neighbors a little better. Show some kindness to the Mexican immigrants—or “wetbacks,” as they’re routinely called in Giant—living in poverty down the road. Acknowledge that women might be capable of and interested in thinking about politics.
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