Text Matters: A Journal of Literature, Theory and Culture Number 10 Literature Goes Pop / Literar(t)y Article 22 Matters 11-24-2020 Frances Wright’s America: A 19th-Century Utopia Justyna Fruzińska University of Lodz Follow this and additional works at: https://digijournals.uni.lodz.pl/textmatters Part of the English Language and Literature Commons, and the Race, Ethnicity and Post-Colonial Studies Commons Recommended Citation Fruzińska, Justyna. "Frances Wright’s America: A 19th-Century Utopia." Text Matters: A Journal of Literature, Theory and Culture, no.10, 2020, pp. 408-422, doi:10.18778/2083-2931.10.22 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Arts & Humanities Journals at University of Lodz Research Online. It has been accepted for inclusion in Text Matters: A Journal of Literature, Theory and Culture by an authorized editor of University of Lodz Research Online. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. Text Matters, Number 10, 2020 http://dx.doi.org/10.18778/2083-2931.10.22 Justyna Fruzińska University of Lodz Frances Wright’s America: A 19th-Century Utopia A BSTR A CT Frances Wright, a British social reformer and feminist, published an account of her American travels: Views of Society and Manners in America in 1821. Wright founded an experimental community in Nashoba, Tennessee, whose aim was to buy black slaves, educate them, and then liberate them. Even though the enterprise turned out to be a failure, the author continued to fight for the cause of black emancipation. My paper examines Wright’s portrayal of America in Views, which, compared to most other early 19th-century British travel accounts, is surprisingly enthusiastic.