Writing for Immortality Anne E. Boyd Published by Johns Hopkins University Press Boyd, Anne E. Writing for Immortality: Women and the Emergence of High Literary Culture in America. Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004. Project MUSE. doi:10.1353/book.60155. https://muse.jhu.edu/. For additional information about this book https://muse.jhu.edu/book/60155 [ Access provided at 29 Sep 2021 03:55 GMT with no institutional affiliation ] This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Writing for Immortality This page intentionally left blank Writing for Immortality Women and the Emergence of High Literary Culture in America Anne E. Boyd The Johns Hopkins University Press Baltimore and London ∫ 2004 The Johns Hopkins University Press All rights reserved. Published 2004 Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper 987654321 The Johns Hopkins University Press 2715 North Charles Street Baltimore, Maryland 21218-4363 www.press.jhu.edu Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Boyd, Anne E., 1969– Writing for immortality: women and the emergence of high literary culture in America / Anne E. Boyd. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references (p.) and index. isbn 0-8018-7875-6 (hardcover : alk. paper) 1. American literature—Women authors—History and criticism. 2. Women and literature—United States—History—19th century. 3. Alcott, Louisa May, 1832–1888—Criticism and interpretation. 4. Phelps, Elizabeth Stuart, 1844–1911—Criticism and interpretation. 5. Stoddard, Elizabeth, 1823–1902—Criticism and interpretation. 6. Woolson, Constance Fenimore, 1840–1894—Criticism and interpretation. 7. American literature—19th century—History and criticism. 8. United States—Intellectual life—1865–1918. 9. Canon (Literature) I. Title. ps217.w64b69 2004 810.9%9287%09034—dc22 2003019050 A catalog record for this book is available from the British Library. For Emma This page intentionally left blank Contents Acknowledgments ix Introduction: New Ambitions 1 1. Solving the ‘‘old riddle of the Sphinx’’: Discovering the Self as Artist 12 2. ‘‘Prov[ing] Avis in the Wrong’’: The Lives of Women Artists 62 3. ‘‘The crown and the thorn of gifted life’’: Imagining the Woman Artist 126 4. ‘‘Recognition is the thing’’: Seeking the Status of Artist 184 Conclusion: The Question of Immortality 234 Chronology 251 Notes 257 Bibliographic Essay 287 Index 295 Illustrations follow page 130 This page intentionally left blank Acknowledgments My special thanks go first and foremost to the many individuals who supported me through my graduate studies and early career as an assistant professor. My parents, Roger Boyd, Beverly Rude, and Bert Rude, have always buoyed me up during times of doubt. Their encouragement over the years made my goals in an uncertain academic climate seem reachable. At Purdue University, my disserta- tion advisers, Leonard Neufeldt, Susan Curtis, Cheryl Oreovicz, and Robert Lamb, deserve my deep appreciation for their careful reading and their invalu- able feedback. Their advice and encouragement made an incalculable difference. I also wish to thank my fellow graduate students, especially Rebecca Saulsbury, Gwen Tarbox, Tom Pendergast, and Jacob Jones, who were supportive comrades in arms. At the University of New Orleans, my current home, I wish to thank all of my colleagues, who have offered support and encouragement in many thoughtful ways. I am grateful to count among my friends the extraordinary Rachel Kaul, Michelle Byrne, Stephanie Stanley, and Lauren Fox, all of whom have spurred me on over the years and provided encouragement for my work. Paul Rioux’s companionship and affection have centered me and given me the joy of my life. This book is very much about women’s struggles to preserve their ambitions and individuality without sacrificing love and companionship. I feel fortunate to have found such a relationship with Paul. Many friends and colleagues devoted their time, energy, and expertise to read- ing drafts of chapters or even the entire manuscript. I am grateful for their willingness to take time out of their very busy lives to give me much-needed feed- back; their comments were always useful and encouraging. My special thanks to Susan Curtis, Catherine Loomis, Gary Richards, Nancy Easterlin, John Hazlett, Rebecca Saulsbury, and Lisa Radinovsky. To Sharon Dean, who generously read a large portion of the manuscript and offered encouragement and advice, I am par- ticularly grateful. Other members of the Constance Fenimore Woolson Society, especially Kathleen Diffley, Cheryl Torsney, Caroline Gebhard, and Kris Com- ment, provided valuable support and guidance over the years. At an early stage in the process of finding a publisher, Nina Baym, Leonard Neufeldt, and Susan x Acknowledgments Curtis were very kind to read drafts of my book proposal and to offer suggestions. Attendees at the New Frontiers in Early American Literature conference at the University of Virginia in 2002 enthusiastically responded to my ideas, asked valuable questions, and gave me the motivation I needed at a crucial stage. I cannot fully express the extent of my gratitude to Robert J. Brugger, Melody Herr, the anonymous reader, the editorial board, and the faculty board at the Johns Hopkins University Press for finding value in my work and recommending its publication. I also appreciate the efforts of Carol Ehrlich, my manuscript edi- tor, whose thoroughness and expertise made this a more polished book. For fi- nancial assistance, I am grateful to the Purdue Research Foundation and to the College of Liberal Arts and the English Department at the University of New Orleans. For permission to reprint images or quote from materials in their collections, I am grateful to the following archives and libraries: Department of Manuscripts, Huntington Library, San Marino, CA; Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Li- brary, Yale University, New Haven, CT; Beverly Historical Society, Beverly, MA; Boston Public Library, Department of Rare Books and Manuscripts, Boston, MA; Houghton Library, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA; Concord Free Public Library, Concord, MA; American Antiquarian Society, Worcester, MA; Western Reserve Historical Society, Cleveland, OH; Manuscripts Division, De- partment of Rare Books and Special Collections, Princeton University Library, Princeton, NJ; Rare and Manuscript Collections, Carl A. Kroch Library, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY; Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Butler Library, Co- lumbia University, New York, NY; New York Public Library, New York, NY; Shelley Collection, Rare Books, University Libraries, Pennsylvania State Uni- versity, University Park, PA; Clifton Waller Barrett Library, University of Vir- ginia, Charlottesville, VA; and Abernethy Library, Special Collections, Middleb- ury College, Middlebury, VT. For help in acquiring the materials I needed for illustrations, I wish to thank Elizabeth Lewis. And photographer Harriet Bloom was a godsend; for her generous flexibility I am thankful. Portions of chapters 1 and 4 first appeared in an earlier form in the journal American Studies as ‘‘ ‘What! Has she got into the ‘‘Atlantic’’?’: Women Writers, the Atlantic Monthly, and the Formation of the American Canon’’ (39, no. 3 [1998]: 5–36); ∫ 1998 Mid-American Studies Association. A portion of chapter 4 appeared in Constance Fenimore Woolson’s Nineteenth Century: Essays, ed. Victoria Brehm (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 2001), as ‘‘Anticipating James, Anticipating Grief: Constance Fenimore Woolson’s ‘‘‘Miss Grief.’’ ’ ’’ I am grate- ful for permission to republish these passages. Writing for Immortality This page intentionally left blank introduction New Ambitions In her article ‘‘The Transitional American Woman,’’ published in the Atlantic Monthly in 1880, Kate Wells paints a critical portrait of the new generation of women who were leaving their homes in great numbers to engage in self-directed pursuits. In their decision to emphasize their own development rather than live only for others, these postbellum American women were making a major break with the past. ‘‘Formerly, to be a good housekeeper, an anxious mother, an obe- dient wife, was the ne plus ultra of female endeavor,—to be all this for others’ sakes. Now it is to be more than one is, for one’s own sake,’’ she complains. Wells portrays a radical transformation in the way women viewed their lives as they became doctors, women’s rights activists, or simply unmarried women. What united them, Wells observes, was their ‘‘ambition’’: ‘‘Women do not care for their home as they did; it is no longer the focus of all their endeavors. Daughters must have art studios outside of their home; [and] authoresses must have a study near by.’’∞ As she suggests, women’s new ambitions were prominently visible in the areas of art and literature, and many other commentators of the era also fo- cused on women’s participation in the literary world as marking a radical depar- ture from previous gender norms. Wells’s article was part of the forefront of what 2 Writing for Immortality would become a common cultural lament about the advent of the ‘‘New Woman.’’ But the seeds of this shift had already been planted in the 1860s and 1870s. In fact, during and after the Civil War, a convergence of cultural factors led some women—primarily white, middle class, and from the Northeast—to envision a place for themselves in the high literary culture that began to emerge in the pages of the Atlantic Monthly and elsewhere. What did it mean for postbellum women to look to the field of literature to realize their ambitions? Certainly many women had already become famous as authors. In fact, the realm of literature was deemed by many male critics and writers to be dominated by women, who had extended their powerful roles as wives and mothers into the public sphere. The prominent female authors of the antebellum era generally had subscribed to the idea that being a good wife and mother was, as Wells indicated, ‘‘the ne plus ultra’’ of their existence. And even those women writers who weren’t married viewed their authorial identities as secondary to their roles as women.