Women Writers

1. Women Writers By: Rachel Fitz and Julie Elkin

2. How They came To Be • Lending Libraries • In the 1780’s in England lending libraries allowed women to distribute their work • Also increased the amount of reading material that other women could buy • Women wanted equality • Used eloquent, common, and instructive language to emphasize this point and illustrate examples of their desired role in society (Irwin)

3. Male vs. female • Male • Make fun of women in their comparisons to Nature • Men emphasized their superior role in society • Even in their artistic expression the language and imagery they chose depicted women • Wrote superior above the general person’s knowledge because they were concerned about losing their place (Jugel)

4. Male vs. Female • Female • Women’s place was at home and in nurturing, domestic side of the world • they had a unique insight because they were not part of the political world • focused on morality and equality rather than the search for “self- creation, self- comprehension and self- positioning” (Jugel)

5. Women brought the language to the reader and formed a connection that increased readership and afforded women more social power as well as presence outside the male dominated world (Jugel)

6. Margaret Fuller

7. Sarah Margaret Fuller Ossoli • born May 23, 1810 in Cambridge Massachusetts • Attended few schools but was mostly taught by her father • Taught her siblings after her father died • Taught in schools for two years, but discovered that it didn’t leave enough time for writing (Goodwin)

8. In 1839, she oversaw “conversations” • they were discussions among women about their lack of access to higher education • She was the first full-time female book reviewer in journalism • She wrote Women in the Nineteenth Century • it was the first major feminist work done in the United States (Sarah)

9. Margaret Fuller was the best-read person in New England • So she was the first woman allowed to use the Harvard Library • She was the first editor of “The Dial” in 1940 • “The Dial” was a quarterly periodical that shared New England opinions about transcendentalism • On this paper she worked under Ralph Waldo Emerson (Sarah)

10. She was on staff of the New York Tribune in 1845 • She worked under Horace Greely • She was sent to Europe as the first female correspondent and became involved in the Italian revolution (Goodwin)

11. She met Giovanni Ossoli • They got married and had a child • On their way back she became shipwrecked with her family • Margaret Fuller drowned July 19th1850 (Goodwin)

12. Louisa May Alcott

13. born in 1832 • Her parents were transcendentalists and focused on reform • She was an American novelist • Best known for Little Women • It was set in her Concord home with her family in 1868 • In Concord she became friends with Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Margaret Fuller, and Nathaniel Hawthorne (MacDonald)

14. Many of her first poems were published under the name AN Barnard • She wrote for the Atlantic Monthly • She enlisted as a nurse when the Civil War broke out • Her letters home resulted in Hospital Sketches • She followed in her mother’s footsteps and became involved in reforms such as abolition of slavery and women’s rights (MacDonald)

15. She wrote many more novels including Good Wives, Little Men. An Old Fashioned Girl, Jo’s Boys, Lulu’s Library, and A Garland for Girls • Louisa May Alcott died in 1888 • She is buried in Sleepy Hollow Cemetery in Concord along with many other famous writers of the time (MacDonald)

16. Harriet Beecher Stowe

17. born in 1811 in Litchfield Connecticut • her father was a famous protestant preacher • began by writing for local religious periodicals • she wrote poems, travel books, biographical sketches and children and adult novels • predated Mark Twain (Harriet)

18. most well known for writing Uncle Tom’s Cabin • Also wrote A Key to Uncle Tom’s Cabin andDred • Lincoln called her “The little lady that made this big war” • Sarah Orne Jewett and Mary Wilkins Freeman were influenced by her • she died in 1896 (Harriet)

19. Questions

20. questions • Name a difference between male and female writing • What was a woman’s place during the Romantic era? • Margaret Fuller oversaw “conversations” What were they? • What was Louisa May Alcott’s most popular novel? • Which president called Harriet Beecher Stowe “ the little lady that started this big war?

21. Answers • Men wrote at a more complicated level than a general person could understand. They also depicted men as superior. Women created more of a connection between the reader and the book. • A woman’s place was in the home where she focused on the family • Conversations were discussions among women about their lack of access to higher education

22. Answers • Louisa May Alcott’s most popular novel was Little Women • President Abraham Lincoln

23. Sources • Goodwin, Joan. "Margaret Fuller." The Dictionary of Unitarian and Universalist Biography. Ed. Peter Hughes and Jim Nugent. N.p., 2009. Web. 24 Mar.      2010. <http://www25.uua.org/uuhs/duub/articles/margaretfuller.html>. • "Harriet Beecher Stowe 1811-1896." A Celebration of Women Writers. Ed. Mary Mark Ockerbloom. N.p., n.d. Web. 24 Mar. 2010.      <http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/stowe/StoweHB.html>. • MacDonald, Ruth K. Louisa May Alcott. Boston: Twayne, 1983. Print. • "(Sarah) Margaret Fuller." American Trancendentalism Web. N.p., n.d. Web. 24      Mar. 2010. <http://www.vcu.edu/engweb/transcendentalism/authors/      fuller/>. • Irwin, Keith Gordon. The Romance of Writing. Illus. Keith Grodon Irwin. New York      City: Macmillan Company of Canada Limited, 1956. 102-155. Print. • Jugel, Matthias L., and Stephan J. Schmidt, eds. "Feminism and Romanticism ." snipsnap.org. Ed. Nfava. N.p., 2002. Web. 24 Mar. 2010.      <http://74.125.93.132/search?q=cache:s2BcR17VDq0J:ssad.bowdoin.edu:8668/space/feminism%2Band%2Bromanticism+importance+of+romanticism+women+writers&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us>.