The Cambridge Companion to Nineteenth-Century American Women's Writing

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Edited by Dale M. Bauer and Philip Gould

Cambridge University Press

Due/Published December 2001, 350 pages, paper

ISBN 0521669758

Providing an overview of the history of writing by women in the period, this companion examines contextually the work of a variety of women writers, including Harriet Beecher Stowe, Rebecca Harding Davis and Louisa May Alcott. The volume provides several valuable tools for students, including a chronology of works and suggestions for further reading.

Contributors: Dale Bauer, Philip Gould, Rosemarie Zagarri, Dana Nelson, Stephanie Smith, Kathryn Zabelle Derounian-Stodola, Elizabeth Petrino, Shirley Samuels, Susan Griffin, Priscilla Wald, Frederika Teute, Gail Smith, Yolanda Pierce, Lisa Long, Sandra Zagarell, Jasmine Griffin, Mary Kelley

Contents

Introduction--Dale Bauer and Philip Gould

Part I. Historical and Theoretical Backgrounds
1. The post colonial culture of early American women's writing--Rosemarie Zagarri
2. Women in public--Dana Nelson
3. Antebellum politics and women's writing--Stephanie Smith

Part II. Genre, Tradition and Innovation
4. Captivity and the literary imagination--Kathryn Zabelle Derounian-Stodola
5. Nineteenth-century American women's poetry--Elizabeth Petrino
6. Women at war--Shirley Samuels
7. Women, anti-Catholicism, and narrative in nineteenth-century America--Susan Griffin
8. Immigration and assimilation in nineteenth-century American women's writing--Priscilla Wald

Part III. Case Studies
9. The uses of writing in Margaret Bayard Smith's New Nation--Frederika Teute
10. The sentimental novel: the example of Harriet Beecher Stowe--Gail Smith
11. African-American women's spiritual narratives--Yolanda Pierce
12. The post-bellum writing of Rebecca Harding Davis and Elizabeth Stuart Phelps--Lisa Long
13. Elizabeth Stoddard's The Morgesons--Sandra Zagarell
14. Minnie's Sacrifice: Frances Ellen Watkins Harper's narrative of citizenship--Jasmine Griffin

Conclusion Mary Kelley.