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The Early American Novel

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Presentation on theme: "The Early American Novel"— Presentation transcript:

1 The Early American Novel
Featuring Hannah Webster Foster

2 The Novel: Definition “[A]n imaginary work in prose of a considerable length, which presents as real certain characters living in a given environment and describes their attitudes, fate, and adventures”—Percy Lubbock

3 The Novel: Possible Origins
France (The Princess of Cleves 1678) Spain (Don Quixote 1605) Italy (various Italian novellas of the Middle Ages) Japan (The Tale of the Genji c. 1000) Greece (prose romances of the second century, classical epics)

4 The Novel: History Genre not really “invented” until mid 18th century England Novel—nouvelle—new, meaning new genre, but also contemporary topics Samuel Richardson’s Pamela (1740) considered by many as first novel Before then novelistic subjects in crime stories, chapbooks, ballads, newspapers

5 The English Novel Influenced by popular Elizabethan prose fiction, which was influenced by Italian novella narratio—“new stories”—mostly realistic short tales written between 1300 and 1500 (The Decameron). The term “novel” sometimes used early on to distinguish certain works of fiction from romances

6 Novel vs. Romance Clara Reeve: “The novel is a picture of real life and manners, and of the times in which it was written. The Romance in lofty and elevated language, describes what never happened nor is likely to”—The Progress of Romance (1785).

7 Early Novels: Three Main Types
Gothic: supernatural tales with mad characters, castles, ruined ancestral halls; innocent maiden held captive by evil male Picaresque: novel of epic scale; gallery of character types, including lower class protagonist who survives by wit and guile; parody of chivalric romance Novel of Sensibility/Sentimentality (sensibility—reliance on feelings as guide to truth, as opposed to pure “common sense”)

8 Gothic Gothic: Castle of Otranto (1764); Wieland (Charles Brockden Brown 1798) Origins in Germany Influenced Poe and Hawthorne Popular today in subgenre of Gothic romance

9 Picaresque The Picaro Picaresque: Tom Jones (1749); Candide (1759); Algerine Captive (Royall Tyler 1797) Vehicle for social satire

10 The Sentimental Novel Also called the novel of sensibility
The rise of women readers Many written as epistolary novels Frequent seduction plot—young female character must face libertine Didactic—teach, socialize young women Pamela (1740); The Coquette (Hannah Webster Foster 1797)

11 Novels Considered Harmful
Easy to read and understand Stimulating Appeal to masses Harmful to soul Harmful to mind Particularly harmful to young women

12 Harmful to Soul Rev. Samuel Miller: “[N]o one was ever an extensive and especially an habitual reader of novels Without suffering both intellectual and moral injury, and of course incurring a diminution of happiness” (1803).

13 Harmful to Mind Thomas Jefferson: “A great obstacle to good education is the inordinate passion prevalent for novels When this poison infects the mind, it destroys its tone Reason and fact, plain and unadorned, are rejected The result is a bloated imagination, sickly judgment, and disgust towards all the real business of life.”

14 The Novel Comes to America
Transatlantic reading culture—Americans enjoyed British novels Imported or “pirated” from Britain (no federal copyright law until 1790; international law until 1891) American novels slow to emerge Puritan roots of American literature—fictionalizing (“lying”) considered duplicitous William Hill Brown, The Power of Sympathy (1789), first American-authored novel

15 The Novel in America Many distrustful of anything not specifically didactic or moralistic Sermons and “improving” works considered only “proper” reading Sentimental novels less condemned Novel reading leads to depravity and vice “You got trouble, right here in River City.” Novels the start or moral decline

16 Severe Reaction in America
Replaced authority of intellectual elite—and authority of the sermon Undermined authority of clergy and upper classes Give false ideas about life Considered especially dangerous to sheltered young women who had little “real life” experience

17 And Feminist Literary Theory
Women Writers And Feminist Literary Theory

18 19th-Century Literature: The Domain of Women
Contrast to New England white male writers Authorship and audiences dominated by women Successful literary careers Development of distinctive forms Introduction of new subjects National and international attention

19 Genres in Early American Women’s Writing
Captivity narratives: Mary Rowlandson Diaries Personal narratives Private and public letters

20 “Women’s” Fiction Written by women for women Typical format:
A heroine outside the patriarchal family Overcomes misfortune by virtue of her own strength and talent Sedgwick's New-England Tale 1822

21 Women’s Fiction Flourishes
Heroines survive and succeed Show strength, intelligence, some independence “Rewarded” with marriage and domesticity Dominated American book market up to 1870 Seriously disturbed male writers and critics Hawthorne: “America is now wholly given over to a d****d mob of scribbling women, and I should have no chance of success while the public taste is occupied with their trash.”

22 Feminist Interpretations
Attempts to show that writers of traditional literature have ignored women and have transmitted misguided and prejudiced views of them; Attempts to stimulate the creation of a critical environment that reflects a balanced view of the nature and value of women;

23 Feminist Literary Movement
Attempts to recover the works of women writers of past times and to encourage the publication of present women writers so that the literary canon may be expanded to recognize women as thinkers and artists; Urges transformations in the language to eliminate inequities and inequalities that result from linguistic distortions.

24 Hannah Webster Foster Victim of bias against popular women writers
Work forgotten for decades Reclaimed and added to the literary canon Literary canon: works deemed worthy of academic study of literature

25 Foster’s Early Life Born 1758 in Salisbury, Mass.
From a wealthy Boston merchant family After mother’s death, sent to boarding school Published short political pieces in newspapers Image not of Foster

26 Foster’s Later Years Writing attracted the attention of Reverend John Foster Married him in 1785 Mothered six children Published The Coquette in 1797 Published The Boarding School in 1799 Died in 1840 at age 81

27 The Coquette Topped best-seller lists in late 1790s and continued in popularity through the 1840s “Founded on Fact” Published anonymously until 1866 Epistolary form Popularity of letter reading Epistolary novels less “dangerous”

28 The Coquette’s Strengths
Psychologically insightful treatment of conventions of sentimentality, seduction and sudden death, punishment of wrong-doing Distinct voice for each character Expresses the political ideology of the time: Desire for personal freedom Desire for individualism Willingness to take risks Prototype of quest-for-freedom motif

29 Love or Money? Marriage as a financial arrangement
“Wages of sin” or “wages of marriage”? Yearnings for “more,” for love Didactic quality in current low-esteem A strength at the time of publication Emphasized factual and/or educative value Choice of virtue or vice?

30 Cult of True Womanhood Four Cardinal Virtues
Piety Purity Submissiveness Domesticity The Coquette as upholding and undermining these virtues

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