19th Century Women Writers
Many readers are familiar with the works of talented authors Jane Austen, Charlotte Brontë, and Emily Brontë, but there is a wealth of writing to enjoy by other women from the 19th century. Check out the library for these oft-overlooked female voices.
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Brontë (1848)
The mysterious new tenant of Wildfell Hall is a strong-minded woman who keeps her own counsel. Narrated by her neighbour Gilbert Markham, and in the pages of her own diary, the novel portrays Helen's eloquent struggle for independence at a time when the law and society defined a married woman as her husband's property.
North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell (1855)
When Margaret Hale is forced to move from her childhood home in the south of England to the northern industrial town of Milton, she is initially disdainful of the unrefined population. Her opinion softens, however, when she befriends the family of a young woman who has become gravely ill from years working in a mill. Now more sympathetic to the plight of the working poor, Margaret repeatedly challenges John Thornton, a family acquaintance and the owner of a local mill. As she becomes more familiar with the intricacies of labor relations, she finds herself conflicted about her feelings for Mr. Thornton.
Aurora Leigh by Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1856)
This verse-novel is a richly detailed representation of the early Victorian age. The social panorama extends from the slums of London, through the literary world, to the upper classes and a number of superb satiric portraits. However, the dominant presence in the work is the narrator, Aurora Leigh herself. From early years in Italy and adolescence in the West Country to the vocational choices, creative struggles, and emotional entanglements of her first decade of adult life, Aurora Leigh develops her ideas on art, love, God, the “Woman Question,” and society.
The Mill on the Floss by George Eliot (1860)
Brought up at Dorlcote Mill, Maggie Tulliver worships her brother Tom and is desperate to win the approval of her parents, but her passionate, wayward nature and her fierce intelligence bring her in to constant conflict with her family. As she reaches adulthood, the clash between their expectations and her desires is painfully played out as she finds herself torn between her relationships with three very different men – her proud and stubborn brother, a close friend who is also the son of her family's worst enemy and a charismatic but dangerous suitor.
Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl by Harriet Jacobs (1861)
In this autobiographical work, the author chronicles her history from a child born into slavery in North Carolina to her eventual emancipation. As a preface to the book, Harriet Jacobs (writing under the name Linda Brent) states: “I have not written my experiences in order to attract attention to myself ... Neither do I care to excite sympathy for my own sufferings. But I do earnestly desire to arouse the women of the North to a realizing sense of the condition of two millions of women at the South, still in bondage, suffering what I suffered, and most of them far worse.”
Lady Audley's Secret by Mary Elizabeth Braddon (1862)
When beautiful young Lucy Graham accepts the hand of Sir Michael Audley, her fortune and her future look secure. But Lady Audley's past is shrouded in mystery, and to Sir Michael's nephew Robert, she is not all that she seems. When his good friend George Talboys suddenly disappears, Robert is determined to find him, and to unearth the truth. His quest reveals a tangled story of lies and deception, crime and intrigue, whose sensational twists turn the conventional picture of Victorian womanhood on its head.
Behind the Scenes by Elizabeth Keckley (1868)
Born into slavery, Elizabeth Hobbs Keckley rose to a position of respect as a talented dressmaker and designer to the political elite of Washington, DC, and a confidante of First Lady, Mary Todd Lincoln. This memoir offers a behind-the-scenes view of the formal and informal networks that African Americans established among themselves.
For Further Research
Not Just Jane by Shelley DeWees
Jane Austen and the Brontës endure as the leading ladies of English literature, but why are these reclusive parsons' daughters the only ones we remember? Funny and fascinating, Shelley DeWees's nonfiction debut, "Not Just Jane," revisits British history through the extraordinary lives and work of seven long-forgotten authoresses – and wonders why they, and so many others, faded into obscurity.
Women and Writing by Virginia Woolf
Known for her novels, and for the dubious fame of being a doyenne of the Bloomsbury Set, in her time Virginia Woolf was highly respected as a major essayist and critic with a special interest and commitment to contemporary literature, and women's writing in particular. This spectacular collection of essays and other writings does justice to those efforts, offering unique appraisals of Aphra Behn, Mary Wollstonecraft, the Duchess of Newcastle, Dorothy Richardson, Charlotte Bronte, and Katherine Mansfield, amongst many others.
A jury of her peers: American women writers from Anne Bradstreet to Annie Proulx by Elaine Showalter
In a narrative of immense scope and fascination – spanning nearly 400 years and brimming with Showalter's characteristic wit and incisive opinions – readers are introduced to more than 250 female writers. These include not only famous and expected names, but also many who were once successful and acclaimed yet now are little known.
A secret sisterhood: the literary friendships of Jane Austen, Charlotte Brontë, George Eliot & Virginia Woolf by Emily Midorikawa & Emma Claire Sweeney
Male literary friendships are the stuff of legend; think Byron and Shelley, Fitzgerald and Hemingway. But the world's best-loved female authors are usually mythologized as solitary eccentrics or isolated geniuses. Coauthors and real-life friends Emily Midorikawa and Emma Claire Sweeney prove this wrong, thanks to their discovery of a wealth of surprising collaborations: the friendship between Jane Austen and one of the family servants, playwright Anne Sharp; the daring feminist author Mary Taylor, who shaped the work of Charlotte Brontë; the transatlantic friendship of the seemingly aloof George Eliot and Harriet Beecher Stowe; and Virginia Woolf and Katherine Mansfield, most often portrayed as bitter foes, but who, in fact, enjoyed a complex friendship fired by an underlying erotic charge.
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