NOTEWORTHY WOMEN IN WORLD LITERATURE.
Reviewing the countless contributions women have made to literature is a task that can be mastered only by devoting to this subject several ponderous volumes. Whether such an attempt has even been made we are unable to say. But the theme is so attractive that I hope that some competent woman author may be inspired to undertake this task. What more beautiful mission could she have than to study and analyze all the scattered evidences of brilliant intellect, rich in imagination, deep emotion, power of expression, soaring enthusiasm, scintillating wit, and profound sorrow, to be found in many of the books written by women since the days of Sappho and Erinna.
Only fragments remain of the beautiful odes, hymns and love-songs produced by the poetesses of the classic past. But that they inspired all Hellas and Rome we know from the testimony of the foremost authors and critics of their time. When Meleager of Gadara, the famous sophist and poet, selected the choicest poems of his predecessors and wove them into that delicious “Garland,” to be hung outside the gate of the Gardens of the Hesperides, he did not forget Sappho, because “though her flowers were few, they were all roses.” And a critic, writing five hundred years after Erinna’s death, speaks of still hearing her swan-note clear above the jangling chatter of the jays, and of still thinking those three hundred hexameter verses sung by this girl of nineteen in “The Distaff” as lovely as the loveliest of Homer. There is also a report, that Corinna, a native of Tanagra, in Bœotia, won five times in poetical contests the prize in competition with Pindar, the greatest lyric poet of Greece.
With greater kindness fate treated the works of Alphaizuli, a Moorish poetess, who lived in Seville during the 8th Century A. D. Of her, who was called “the Arabian Sappho,” two volumes of excellent verses are preserved in the library of the Escurial. Likewise Labana and Leela, two Moorish poetesses, were famous throughout beautiful Andalusia during the 10th and the 13th Century. Of Valada, the daughter of the Moorish King Almostakeph, of Corduba, her contemporaries report that she several times contended with scholars noted for their eloquence and knowledge, and quite often bore away the palm.
That such contests were held in great favor by learned ladies, appears from the institution of those famous poetical festivals known as “Jeux Floraux” or Floral Games. They are said to have been established in the 11th or the 12th Century by a gay company of French minstrels, called “the seven troubadours.” But in time they had become forgotten. It is due to Clemence Isaure, a poetess born in 1464 at Toulouse, that these festivals were renewed. Fixing the first of May as the day of these Floral Games, she invited all poets and poetesses to participate in peaceful contest, assigning as prizes for the victors five different flowers, wrought in gold and silver. There was an amaranth of gold for the best ode; a silver violet for a poem of from sixty to one hundred Alexandrine lines; a silver eglantine for the best prose composition; a silver marigold for an elegy, and a silver lily for a hymn.
These contests have been held in Toulouse through all the centuries. They were recognized by the French Government in 1694, and confirmed by letters-patent from the king. Some twenty-five years ago they were likewise introduced into Germany, and held first in Cologne.
The brilliant age of the Renaissance produced several women writers and poets, whose works are still read. The literary annals of Italy shine with such illustrious names as Cassandra Fidelis, the Venetian; Veronica Gambara, of Brescia; Lucia Bertana, of Bologna; Tarquenia Molza, of Modena; Gaspara Stampa, of Padua; and the great Vittoria Colonna, of Marino, whose sonnets as well as her beauty and virtues were extolled by all contemporaries.
In Spain Marianne de Carbajal and Maria de Zayas, during the 17th Century, the classic period of Spanish literature, became the pride of their country.
In France Marguerite d’Angouleme wrote a delightful book, “the Heptameron,” similar in plan to the famous “Decamerone” by Boccaccio. In the middle of the 16th Century Louise Labbé, known in French literature as “La belle cordière,” produced her “Debat de Folie et d’Amour,” a work full of wit, originality and beauty. Erasmus and La Fontaine were both indebted to it; the former for the idea of “The Praise of Folly,” and the latter for “L’Amour et la Folie.” In truth, La Fontaine’s poem is only a versification of the prose story of Louise Labbé.
Of the illustrious French women, who during the 16th, 17th and 18th Centuries made their “salons” the gathering-places for men and women of letters, several became widely known for their own poems and works of fiction. As for instance Madeline de Scudéry, Anne de Seguier, Claudine de Tencin, Madame de la Sabliére, Madeline de Souvré, and Anne Dacier, of whom Voltaire said, that no woman ever rendered greater services to literature.
A FLORAL GAME DURING THE 14TH CENTURY.
After a painting by F. Padilla.
In the literature of the 19th Century Anne Louise Germaine Necker, Baroness de Stael-Holstein, held a singular position. Many of her contemporaries exalted her as “the founder of the romantic movement” who gave “ideas” to the world. To-day she is almost forgotten, and her novels and plays, among them “Corinne” and “Sophie and Jane Grey” lie undisturbed and dusty on the library shelves.
Perhaps her most remarkable contribution to literature was her book “L’Allemagne,” which was announced in 1810. It gave a most intelligent exposition of the science, literature, arts, philosophy, and other characteristics of the Germans, gathered from the author’s own observations. The work, written with a spirited independence, quite at variance with the deadening political influence of Napoleon, irritated the emperor to such a degree that he ordered the minister of police to seize and destroy the whole edition of 10,000 copies. Besides this he exiled the author from France. When, after the overthrow of Napoleon, she returned to Paris, she had her book printed again, and had the satisfaction of seeing it eagerly read by millions of Frenchmen.
Of all French authoresses of the 19th Century Armantine Lucile Aurore Dudevant, or “George Sand,” holds the supreme rank. In the long line of her thoughtful, concentrated and meditative novels “Valentine,” “Indiana,” “Lelia,” “Mauprat,” and “Le Meunier d’ Angibault” are real gems of fiction, whose influence can be traced in many later works by writers of France and other nations.
Of her contemporaries Louise Révoil Colet, Eugenie de Guérin, Pauline de la Ferronay Craven, and, above all, Delphine de Girardin must be mentioned, whose “Letters Parisiennes” as well as her poems, novels, dramas and comedies belong to the most excellent productions of the 19th Century. By her dramatic pieces “L’Ecole des Journalistes,” “Judith,” “Cleopatra,” “C’est la faute du mari,” “Lady Tartufe,” and others she reaped a wide popularity. In the literary society of her time she exercised no small personal influence. Balzac, Alfred de Musset, Gautier, and Victor Hugo were among the frequenters of her salon.
Among the British woman writers of the latter part of the 18th Century Jane Austen was the most distinguished. Her novels “Sense and Sensibility,” “Pride and Prejudice,” “Emma,” “Northanger Abbey” and “Persuasion” have been likened to the carefully-executed paintings of the Dutch masters for their charming pictures of quiet, natural life.
Ann Ward Radcliffe wrote three novels unsurpassed of their kind in English literature: “The Romance of the Forest,” “The Mysteries of Udolpho,” and “The Italian.” They are distinguished for originality, ingenuity of plot, fertility of incident, and skill in devising apparently supernatural occurrences capable of explanation by human agency and natural coincidence.
Mary Russell Mitford edited several volumes of sketches of rural character and scenery, delightful and finished in style, and unrivalled in her manner of description. It is by these sketches of English life that she obtained the greatest share of her popularity. She wrote also an opera called “Sadak and Kalasrade,” and four tragedies, “Julian,” “Foscari,” “Rienzi,” and “Charles the First.” All were successful; “Rienzi,” in particular, long continued a favorite.
Elizabeth Inchbald’s two novels “The Simple Story” and “Nature and Art,” have long ranked among standard works. Besides novels she wrote a number of dramas, some of which were very successful.
Maria Edgeworth published a new work almost every year from the beginning of the 19th Century to 1825. The novels “Castle Rackrent,” “Belinda,” “Vivian.” “Harrington and Ormond,” and many others followed each other rapidly, and all were welcomed and approved by the public. Her best and last work of fiction, “Helen,” appeared in 1834.
Mary Shelley, the wife of the famous poet Percy Shelley, is renowned as the author of the romances “Frankenstein,” “Valperga, or the Life and Adventures of Castruccio, Prince of Lucca”; “Falkner”; “Lodore,” and “The Fortunes of Perkin Warbeck.” A most peculiar work is “The Last Men,” a fiction of the final agonies of human society owing to the universal spread of pestilence.
Among the dramatists of the 19th Century Joanna Baillie was the foremost. In her “Plays of Passion” she illustrates each of the deepest and strongest passions of the human mind, such as Hate, Love, Jealousy, Fear, by a tragedy and a comedy. Other dramas were “The Family Legend”; “Henriquez”; “The Separation,” and other plays, which show remarkable power of analysis, and observation. They are all written in vigorous style.
Of the numerous novelists of the 19th Century Charlotte Bronté was received with universal delight. Her novels “Jane Eyre,” “Shirley” and “Villette” have all the vigor and individuality of poetic genius. She was “a star-like soul, whose genius followed no tradition and left no successors.”
Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell will be remembered for her intensely interesting books “Mary Barton,” “North and South,” the exquisitely humorous “Cranford,” and “Cousin Phyllis,” which has been fitly called an idyll in prose.
The prolific Catherine Grace Gore gives in the novels “The Banker’s Wife,” “Cecil, or the Adventures of a Coxcomb,” “Greville,” and “Ormington,” masterful pictures of the life and pursuits of the English upper classes.
Caroline Elizabeth Norton, after having given in her novel “The Undying One” a version of the legend of the Wandering Jew, became in her book “A voice from the Factories” a most eloquent priestess of reforms. She condemned especially child labor, the darkest blot on the social conditions of England.
In the middle of the 19th Century Mary A. Evans became famous under her nom de plume “George Eliot.” Having translated in 1844 David Strauss’ brilliant work “Das Leben Jesu,” and Spinoza’s “Ethics,” she published in 1858 her novel “Adam Bede,” which placed her at once in the front rank of modern authors. Her later novels “The Mill on the Floss,” “Silas Marner,” “Romola” and “Felix Holt” proved so many contributions to her fame.
In recent times the works of Mary Edgeworth, Charlotte R. Lenox, Anne M. Fielding Hall, Mary Braddon, Elizabeth Sheppard, Louise de la Ramée (Ouida), Matilde Blind, Anna Seward and Charlotte M. Younge have won much appreciation.
Of the woman-authors born in Scotland, Margaret Oliphant wrote “Chronicles of Carlingford” and the charming novels “Merkland”; “The Quiet Heart”; “Zaidee,” all of which are exquisite delineations of Scottish life and character. Another Scottish woman-author deserving of mention is Mary Ferrier, whose novels “Marriage,” “The Inheritance,” and “Destiny” breathe much originality and humor.
Of the Irish novelists Julia Kavanagh and Margaret Hamilton Hungerford must be mentioned, the former for her volumes “French Women of Letters”; and “English Women of Letters,” as well as for her novels “Adele”; “The Pearl Fountain”; “Sibyl’s Second Love”; and “Daisy Burns.” Marg. Hungerford’s novel “Molly Brown” has been much admired.
Mary Augusta Ward, born in Tasmania, became favorably known through her principal novel “Robert Elsmere,” which delineates effectively the modern spiritual unrest and attempts to proclaim an ideal religion.
Another noteworthy author of Tasmania is Louisa Anne Meredith.
England has of course also a long roll of able poetesses, among them Sarah Flower Adams, who wrote the beautiful hymn “Nearer, My God, to Thee.” Alison Cockburn, Anne Barnard and Caroline Oliphant are the authors of many fine Scotch songs and ballads, among them the famous poems “Flowers of the Forest” and “Auld Robin Gray.”
In recognition of the grace and delicacy of her lyrics Elizabeth Barrett Browning has been called “the most distinguished poet of her sex that England ever produced,” but at the same time “the most unreadable.” Her fame rests chiefly on her “Drama of Exile,” the “Casa Guidi Windows,” and “Aurora Leigh.” The latter is a social epic, which contains many noble passages that give evidence of great originality and power.
Sarah Coleridge has been much admired for the gracefulness and the beautiful language of her poems “Phantasmion, a Fairy Tale”; “Sylvan Stay,” and “One Face Alone.”
The poems of Felicia Hemans have been the result of a fine imagination and temperament, and of a life spent in romantic seclusion. Many of them, as for instance “Homes of England,” “The Treasures of the Deep,” “The Better Land,” and “The Wreck” rank among the best ever produced.
Adelaide Ann Proctor, Catherine Fowler Philips, Christina Rosetti, Mary Blackford Tighe, and Caroline Oliphant have been the authoresses of many poems, still cherished for their beauty and nobility of thought.
The United Kingdom has also several woman historians, among them Catharine Macaulay, whose “History of England,” in six volumes, appeared in 1763.
The love and reverence she was taught from childhood to cherish for the queens of her country induced Miss Agnes Strickland, of Roydon Hall, Suffolk, to write her great work “The Lives of the Queens of England.” Its twelve volumes appeared at intervals from 1840 till 1848. In 1850 she began to publish a similar series about the “Lives of the Queens of Scotland,” completing it in eight volumes in 1859. Unresting in her industry, she wrote likewise “The Lives of the Last Four Stuart Princesses,” published in 1872.
Harriet Martineau too deserves an honorable place among English women of letters. Her series of tales designed as “Illustrations of Political Economy” and “Illustrations of Taxation” brought her at once into great prominence. Later on she produced an amazing quantity of works, relating to the laws of man’s nature and development, mesmerism, travel, and other subjects.
In American literature woman’s activity began with Anne Bradstreet, the daughter of Governor Bradstreet of Massachusetts. To him she dedicated the first volume of poetry published on the Western hemisphere. Printed in 1642, it had the somewhat verbose title: “Several Poems, compiled with great variety of wit and learning, full of delight; wherein especially is contained a complete discourse and description of the four elements, constitutions, ages of man, seasons of the year, together with an exact epitome of the three first monarchies, viz.: the Assyrian, Persian, Greecian, and Roman Commonwealth, from the beginning to the end of their last king, with divers other pleasant and serious poems. By a Gentlewoman of New England.” Three editions of this collection appeared.
Of several poems, directed to her husband, we give the following lines:
“If ever two were one, then surely we;
If ever man were loved by wife, then thee;
If ever wife were happy in a man,
Compare with me, ye women, if ye can!”
Hannah Adams, born in 1755, was the first American woman who made literature her profession. Interested in religious controversy she compiled a “View of Religions,” in three parts. After that she wrote “Evidences of Christianity,” a “History of the Jews,” and a “History of New England.” As far as pecuniary matters went, she was, however, singularly unsuccessful, probably from her want of knowledge of business, and ignorance in worldly matters. At the time when she was engaged in compiling her books, so rare were woman-writers in America, that she was looked upon as one of the wonders of her age.
In 1790 appeared a novel, “Charlotte Temple,” a story of love, betrayal, and desertion, by Mrs. Susanna Haswell Rowson, a book of which more than a hundred editions are known.
With the beginning of the 19th Century the number of American authoresses increased rapidly. Catharine and Susan Sedgwick wrote their “New England Tales,” which were received with such favor, that Catharine in 1824 published a novel in two volumes, entitled “Redwood,” a work which met with great success, was republished in England, and translated into French and Italian. It was followed by a large number of other novels, which were greatly appreciated for their purity of language and grace of style.
Somewhat later Lydia Maria Child developed as one of the first and foremost progressive writers. Having commenced her literary life with “Hobomok, a Story of the Pilgrims,” she later on devoted herself to the cause of woman and the abolition of slavery. She wrote a “History of Woman,” which was followed in 1833 by a strong “Appeal for that Class of Americans Called Africans,” the first anti-slavery work ever printed in book form in America. In 1841 she moved to New York and assisted her husband in editing “The National Anti-Slavery Standard.”
As is very generally known, her contemporary, Harriet Beecher Stowe, too, was interested in the question of abolition. In 1850 she wrote for the “National Era,” an anti-slavery paper, a serial entitled “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.” When this novel was republished in book form it met with tremendous success. In the United States between 300,000 and 400,000 copies were sold within three years, and the printing press had to run day in and out to meet the demand. In Europe the book was devoured with the same deep interest. There are thirty-five different editions in English, and translations in at least twenty different languages. As the novel was also dramatized in various forms, it became a great factor in the abolishment of slavery.
Of the later stories by Mrs. Stowe “The Minister’s Wooing,” a tale of New England life in the latter part of the 18th Century, has been pronounced to be her best. But her reputation, while it lasts, will rest chiefly upon “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.”
Sarah Margaret Fuller too belongs to those authors who espoused the cause of woman’s rights. In “The Dial,” a little quarterly journal, the organ of the transcendentalists and of the famous community at Brook Farm, she first published “The Great Lawsuit.” It formed the nucleus of a larger volume entitled “Woman in the Nineteenth Century.” Far in advance of the ideas of her times, it is with its noble sentiments and valuable hints a spirited plea for the rights of the female sex.
Elizabeth Ellet is favorably known for her valuable work “The Women of the American Revolution,” published in 1848 in three volumes. It was followed in 1850 by the “Domestic History of the American Revolution,” designed to give an inside view into the spirit of that period, and to describe the social and domestic conditions of the colonists and their feelings during the war.
Ann Sophia Stephens, and Emma D. Southworth were likewise immensely popular fiction writers during the first half of the 19th Century. So was Maria S. Cummins, who in “The Lamplighter” achieved a success comparable to that of Mrs. Stowe’s “Uncle Tom.”
The many short stories and novels of Mary Virginia Terhune, who wrote under the pseudonym of Marion Harland; the romances of Harriet Prescott Spofford, Miriam Coles Harris, Elizabeth Barstow Stoddard, and Adeline Whitney, are now almost forgotten. Also the novels of Lydia Sigourney of Norwich, Connecticut, who holds the record of being one of the most prolific female writers in America. She produced not less than fifty-seven volumes, among them “Letters to Mothers”; “Water-Drops,” a contribution to the temperance-cause; “Pleasant Memories in Pleasant Lands”; “Pocahontas”; and “Traits of the Aborigines of America,” a descriptive poem in five cantos.
Elizabeth Stuart Phelps enjoyed with her “Sunny Side” and other tales a phenomenal success. Her daughter, Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Ward, was in her time regarded as the greatest American woman novelist, who has most influenced the women of the United States. “The Silent Partner”; “Hedged In”; “Dr. Zay”; “The Story of Avis” as almost all other stories of the Phelps are laid in New England and exquisitely describe its nature, past, and present conditions.
Jane Goodwin Austin, Rose Terry Cooke, Annie Trumbull Slosson, Clara Louise Burnham, Alice Brown and Mary E. Wilkins Freeman belong also to the woman-authors whose works deal with colonial and present-day life in the New England States.
Of the woman-authors, who realized the possibilities of the romantic life and history of the early settlers and pioneers, Mary Johnston and Mary Hartwell Catherwood were the most successful. To the former we are indebted for the romances “Prisoners of Hope,” and “To Have and to Hold”; to the latter for the novels “The Lady of Fort St. John,” “The White Islander,” “Old Kaskaskia,” “Lazarre” and others.
Under the pen name of Charles Egbert Craddock Mary Noailles Murfree published a series of highly interesting short stories “In the Tennessee Mountains.” Displaying an intimate knowledge of the mountaineers of Eastern Tennessee, and full of life, these stories attracted at once wide attention. They were followed later on by a large number of other novels, of which “The Prophet of the Great Smoky Mountains,” “In the Clouds,” “The Frontiersmen” and “The Storm Centre” have secured to Miss Murfree a place of honor among present-day writers.
Alice French under her well-known pen name Octave Thanet sketched in her short stories life in Iowa and Arkansas; Ruth McEnery Stuart wrote amusing stories of negro life in Louisiana.
Gertrude Franklin Atherton achieved a wide reputation with her charming romances of early Californian life, among which “The Doomswoman” and “The Californians” are the most remarkable. Of her later novels “The Conqueror” and “A Whirl Asunder” need to be mentioned.
Mary Hallock Foote, having likewise studied the conditions of the Far West, in her admirable stories “The Led-Horse Claim,” “Cœur d’Alene,” and “The Chosen Valley” carries the reader into the romance of Western mining camps and of the virgin wilderness.
Helen Hunt Jackson, whose literary productions, over the signature “H. H.,” began to attract attention about 1870, offered a truly native flower to American literature in her poetic book “Ramona.” Intensely alive and involving the reader in its movement, it yet contains an idyl of singular loveliness. “Ramona,” says Helen J. Cone in an essay about American literature, “stands as the most finished, though not the most striking, example that what American women have done notably in literature they have done nobly.”
The various works of Constance Fenimore Woolson, a grand-niece of Fenimore Cooper, also enjoyed general approval. In her best known novels: “East Angels,” “Jupiter Lights,” and “Horace Chase” she attained a high standard of excellence.
Frances Hodgson Burnett created in her book “Through One Administration” a pathetic story of the intricate political life in Washington. Furthermore she gave in “Louisiana” and in “The Pretty Sister of José” charming pictures of Southern conditions.
Mrs. Burton N. Harrison and Edith Wharton delighted their many readers with highly interesting novels and short stories of New York City Life, full of local color. Of the former author’s works “The Anglomaniacs,” “Golden Rod,” and “The Circle of a Century” show her great skill in the dialogue. Of the many novels and short stories of Miss Wharton “The House of Mirth,”, “The Greater Inclination,” “Sanctuary,” and “Crucial Instances” are perhaps the best.
Among the American novelists of our present days Margaret Deland is without question one of the most popular. Her novels “John Ward,” “Sidney,” “Tommy Dove,” “Philip and His Wife,” “The Wisdom of Fools,” “Dr. Lavendar’s People,” and “The Awakening of Helen Richie” rank among the best in American fiction.
The literary work of Anna Katherine Green, Kate Douglas Wiggins, Molly Elliot Seawell, Ellen Glasgow, Mary Shipman Andrews, Leona Dalrymple, Margaret Sherwood, and many other woman authors, excellent as much as it is, can only be referred to summarily.
To enrol the names of those American women who since the days of Anne Bradstreet have expressed their thoughts and emotions in poetry, would be a task far exceeding the limits of this volume. Confining ourselves to the most noteworthy, we mention first the sisters Alice and Phœbe Cary. Among their many splendid poems and novels “Hualco, a Romance of the Golden Age of Tezcuco,” is founded upon adventures of a young Mexican chief, as related by several Spanish historians of the time of the conquest. Of Alice Cary exist several hymns, one of which is almost a classic in the purity of its sentiment.
The poetic spirit of Julia Ward Howe found expression in “Passion Flowers” (1854) and “Lyrics” (1866). Her most memorable poem is the “Battle Hymn of the Republic,” which breathes fervent patriotism and gives expression to the deep moral purpose of the Civil War.
The poetry of Helen Jackson unquestionably takes rank above that of any American woman. Emerson rated it above that of almost all American men. Her works include simple poetry of domestic life as well as love-poems of extraordinary intensity and imaginative fullness, furthermore, verses showing most intimate sympathy with external nature; and lastly, a few poems of the highest dignity and melody in the nature of odes, such as “A Christmas Symphony” and “A Funeral March.”
The numerous lyrics of Elizabeth Oakes Smith, E. O. Kinney, Frances S. Osgood, Anne L. Botta, Sarah Helen Whitman, Maria Lowell, Harriet W. Sewall, Emily Judson and many other women poets of the last half century show a development corresponding to that traceable in the field of American fiction.
In recent times a large number of gifted women have contributed to the general chorus new notes of unusual strength and beauty. Many names deserve a place upon the honor roll; among them Margaret J. Preston, Elizabeth Allen, Julia Dorr, Mary E. Bradley, Nora Perry, Mary C. Hudson, Margaret Sangster, Charlotte Bates, May Riley Smith, Edna Dean Proctor, Elizabeth Stuart Phelps, Alice Wellington Rollins, Edith Thomas, Emma Lazarus, Kate Osgood, and Ella Wheeler Wilcox.
In other branches of literature, to which comparatively few women have chosen to devote themselves, as for instance in history, several American women have shown remarkable talent and thoroughness.
First among these historians stands Mrs. Mercy Otis Warren, the same who with Mrs. Abigail Smith Adams, the wife of President John Adams, shared the belief that the Declaration of Independence should consider not the freedom of man alone, but that of woman also. Having warmly entered the contest between England and America, Mrs. Warren had corresponded with many of the leading men of the time; these often consulted her, and acknowledged the soundness of her judgment on many of the important events before and after the war. The most valuable of her writings appeared in 1805, under the title “The History of the Rise, Progress, and Termination of the American Revolution, interspersed with Biographical, Political, and Moral Observations.” The three volumes of this work, dedicated to George Washington, are valuable as a true record of the events and feelings of those great times.
To Martha Lamb the citizens of the metropolis on the Hudson River are indebted for a comprehensive “History of New York City.” Agnes Laut penned a series of articles about the discovery of the farthest Northwest. Ellen Mackay Hutchinson compiled with Edmund Clarence Stedman “A Library of American Literature,” which in 1888 appeared in ten volumes; it shows excellent judgment, knowledge and care. Ida Tarbell produced among many other works a “Life of Abraham Lincoln” and an exceedingly interesting “History of the Standard Oil Company.” Katherine Coman published the “Industrial History of the United States.”
“A Century of Dishonor” is the title of a sensational book, written by Helen Hunt Jackson, and published in 1881. During her extensive travels in the Far West the author became deeply interested in the much maltreated Indians. Disgusted by the shameless robberies and lawless acts committed by many Indian Agents on the reservations, Mrs. Jackson wrote her book, which is one of the strongest indictments ever directed against the Government. Through this volume she succeeded in doing much to ameliorate the unfortunate conditions of the Red Race.
Mrs. John A. Logan compiled a valuable volume, entitled “The Part taken by Women in American History.”
Woman’s status in the laws of the forty-eight states belonging to the United States of America has been treated by Rose Falls Bres in the valuable book “The Law and the Woman,” published in 1917 at New York.
The great movement for Women Suffrage found of course likewise its historians. Four of the most prominent leaders and best authorities: Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, Matilda Joslyn Gage, and Ida Husted Harper combined for the difficult task of collecting, sifting, and putting together the immense mass of material. Their “History of Woman Suffrage,” published in five huge volumes, is not only a noble record, but at the same time a magnificent monument to women’s courage, indefatigability and perseverance.
A considerable number of women have also contributed to the literature about suffrage, social culture, labor questions, and kindred subjects. Anna G. Spencer produced the book “Woman’s Share in Social Culture”; Charlotte P. Gilman devoted a volume to “Home” and a second volume to “Woman and Economics”; Alice M. Earle described “Childlife in Colonial Times”; Ellen Key gave a study of “Love and Marriage”; Mary Eastman published “Woman’s Work in America”; Olive Schreiner wrote “Woman and Labor,” and Elisabeth Butler “Woman in the Trades.” To Jane Addams the world is indebted for several well written works, among them: “Democracy and Social Ethics”; “The Spirit of Youth”; “An Ancient Evil and a New Conscience,” and “New Ideals of Peace.” She gave a record of her great settlement work in Chicago in her delightful book “Twenty Years at Hull House.”
For many centuries the Germans have been known as great writers, poets and philosophers. Perhaps no other nation has contributed so much to the world’s literature. Before the unfortunate year of 1914 the annual output of Germany in works of science, art, philosophy, technics and fiction far surpassed that of any other country, even that of France, Great Britain and America combined.
In these contributions German women have a conspicuous share. Their great interest in this line of activity can be traced back to the early days of the Middle Ages, when nuns like Hroswitha glorified the deeds of great emperors, or, like the Abbess of Hohenburg, undertook the bold enterprise of compiling a cyclopædia of general knowledge.
Germany had also the first periodicals for women, the earliest dating back to 1644, much read and patronized by the members of the gentle sex. Its title “Frauenzimmer-Gesprächspiele” (“Playful discussion for ladies”) indicates that it was devoted exclusively to matters of the “eternal feminine.”
A similar periodical was “Die vernünftigen Tadlerinnen” (“The reasonable fault-finders”), edited by Johann Christoph Gottsched, professor of philosophy and poetry at the University at Leipzig. The most faithful of his assistants and collaborators was his wife, known in German literature as Louise Adelgunde Gottschedin. To the “Deutsche Schaubühne,” likewise published by her husband, she contributed several translations of French Dramas and five comedies of her own, which are still of interest as they illustrate the manners of the time, the middle of the 18th Century.
Meta Moller, the wife of the famous poet Klopstock, Friedericke C. Neuber, and Rahel Levin, the wife of the historian Varnhagen von Ense, made similar use of their great literary abilities. The salon of Mrs. Varnhagen in Berlin from 1814 to 1830 was the meeting place for the most celebrated intellects of Germany, among them Humboldt, Fichte, Schleiermacher, von Kleist, and Heinrich Heine.
The great poetess Annette von Droste-Hülshoff (1797–1848) wrote a most powerful novel, “Die Judenbuche”, which is based on the belief that murderers are forced by a mysterious power to return to the scene of their crimes.
The prolific but now almost forgotten writers Karoline Pichler, Henriette Paalzow, Otilie Wildermut, Countess Ida Hahn-Hahn, Fanny Lewald and Louise Mühlbach were followed in the second part of the 19th Century by Eugenie John, better known under her nom de plume Marlitt. Her novels “Das Geheimniss der alten Mamsell” (“Old Mamselle’s Secret”), “Heideprinzesschen” (“The Princess of the Moor”), “Gold Else” (“Gold Elsie”) and others met with tremendous success and have been in translations also enjoyed by many English and American readers.
With like enthusiasm the women of Germany read the novels of Wilhelmine Heimburg, Louise von Francois (“Die letzte Reckenburgerin”) and Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach. The latter is regarded as the greatest of all modern novelists of Germany, Paul Heyse not excepted. When the University in Vienna bestowed upon her the degree of Doctor phil. honoris causa, the enormous body of her readers heartily rejoiced. Her most famous novel is “Das Gemeindekind” (“The child of the Parish”). She also published a volume of “Aphorisms.”
Wilhelmine von Hillern’s once much read novel “Die Geierwally” has been surpassed by far more valuable works of Ilse Frapan, Ida Boy-Ed, Helene Pichler, Margarete von Bülow, Bianca Bobertag, Ossip Schubin, Helene Böhlau, Emma Vely, Emmy von Dinklage, Dora Dunker, Marie von Bunsen, Sophie Junghans, Louise Westkirch, Clara Blüthgen, Olga Wohlbrück, Carry Brachvogel and a number of other modern writers.
Among them Enrica von Handel-Mazetti and Ricarda Huch are distinguished by their great ability in drawing strong characters as well as deeply affecting situations. The first of the two authors transports her readers in the two novels “Meinrad Helmpergers denkwürdiges Jahr” and “Jesse und Maria” to the turbulent times of the 17th and 18th Centuries, when a superstitious world was upset by cruel warfare between Catholics and Protestants. Ricarda Huch created works of equal value in the novels “Erinnerungen von Ludolf Urslen dem Jüngeren” (“Reminiscences of Ludolf Urslen, Junior”), “Aus der Triumphgasse” (“From the Alley of Triumph”) and “The Verteidigung Roms” (“The Defense of Rome”).
Elizabeth von Heyking carried the reader to the more recent times of the Chinese Boxer War with her admirable novel “Briefe die ihn nicht erreichten” (“Letters he did not get”).
Clara Viebig belongs likewise to the great novelists of modern times. Having manifested in her first collection of short stories, “Kinder der Eifel” (“Children of the Eifel Plateau”), a most extraordinary gift of observation and description, she brought this talent to full development in her splendid novels “Rheinlandstoechter” (“Daughters of the Rhein”), “Das schlafende Heer” (“The sleeping army”) and “Absolve te.”
Gabriele Reuter treated in her novels “Aus guter Familie” (“Of good family”), “Frau Bürgelin und ihre Söhne,” “Ellen von der Weiden,” and “Liselotte von Reckling” various phases of the woman’s question. In the first book she protests against the injustice created by custom and tradition, which allows men to propose, while women are condemned to remain silent.
Finally we must mention the noble woman who, most intensely realizing the deep longing of mankind for peace, with her famous book “Die Waffen nieder!” (“Lay down your arms!”) exerted probably the greatest influence any author ever had through a single volume: the Austrian Bertha von Suttner. The powerful appeal of this great book, which was translated into more than twenty different languages, led Alfred B. Nobel, a rich Swedish scientist and the inventor of dynamite, to bequeath the annual interest of his great fortune to whoever has contributed most to the peaceful progress of mankind during the year immediately preceding. It was not more than just that the great merit of Madame von Suttner was acknowledged by awarding to her in 1905 the Nobel Prize for peace.
Having devoted her whole life to the cause of peace, Bertha von Suttner died in June, 1914, while engaged in preparations for an International Peace Congress to be held in September of that same year in Vienna. Fate spared her the bitter disappointment to see the outbreak of the most cruel and destructive war in history. But her call “Lay down your arms!” will live. It will remain the watchword and summons of all who with this high-priestess of peace believe that war is the most unreasonable and most criminal act men can commit.
Of course, German women have also contributed to the literature about the woman’s question. Perhaps the most valuable work in this line is Dr. Kaethe Schirmacher’s book “Die moderne Frauenbewegung,” giving a history of the woman’s rights movement in all countries of the world. As there has been no English book covering this broad subject, it was translated by C. C. Eckhardt and in 1912 published at New York under the title “The Modern Woman’s Rights Movement.”
Rich as German literature is in prose works of women writers, its poems and lyrics written by women are no less noteworthy. There can be no doubt that many of the beautiful folk songs of the Middle Ages were created by women. For instance the following was discovered in a collection of songs of the 13th Century, compiled by the nuns of a convent at Blaubeuren, Bavaria:
Kume, kum, geselle min,
ih enbite harte din,
ih enbite harte din,
kume, kum, geselle min!
Süsser rosen-varmer munt,
kum und mache mich gesunt,
kum und mache mich gesunt,
süsser rosen-varmer munt!
That women took deep interest in folk-songs we know from the fact that several of the most valuable collections of mediæval songs came down to us through women like Clara Haetzler, a nun in Augsburg, and Katharine Zell. The latter states that these lovely poems were sung by workmen and vintages as well as by the mothers at the cradle, and by the servants while they were washing the dishes.
It is not before the 17th Century that women authors of poems begin to write under their names. Among them we find the countesses Anna Sophie von Hesse-Darmstadt (1638–1683) and Amalia Juliane von Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt. The latter was the author of about six hundred songs, of which the funeral-hymn “Wer weiss wie nahe mir mein Ende” is sung in all Protestant churches of Germany to-day.
The 18th Century produced a number of other women poets, among them Louise Adelgunde Gottsched, Dorothea, Countess von Zinzendorf, Anna Louise Karsch, Sidonie Zäunemann, and Christine Marianne von Ziegler. The last two enjoyed the special patronage of the Emperor, who bestowed upon them the title “Kayserlich gekrönte Poetinnen.”
With the beginning of the 19th Century appeared new groups of women poets, among them Bettina von Arnim, Karoline von Günderode, Elisabeth Kulmann, Louise Brachmann, Betty Paoli, Louise von Ploennies and Adelheid von Stolterfoth, the “Philomele of the Rhine,” so called for her lovely songs and tales in praise of that noble river. In 1797 one of the greatest female poets of all times was born: Annette von Droste-Hülshoff, a native of Westphalia. Compelled to lead a quiet, secluded life by the delicate state of her health, she devoted herself to study and literature, and wrote a number of masterful ballads of which “The Battle in Loenerbruch” has few equals in powerful and realistic description. Her poem “Die beschränkte Frau” is one of the gems of German poetry.
Among the large numbers of German poets of the latter part of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th Century Isolde Kurz, Lulu von Strauss, Margarete Beutler, Agnes Miegel, Tekla Lingen, Ricarda Huch, Frieda Schanz, Anna Ritter, Hedwig Dransfeld, Wilhelmine Wickenburg-Almasy, Hermione von Preuschen, Klara Müller-Jahnke, Hedda Sauer, Maria Eugenie delle Grazie, Angelika von Hörmann, Marie Janitschek, Ada Christen, Mia Holm, Alberta von Puttkammer, Anna Klie, are the names of a few of the many distinguished poets of our present days.
Among American women of German descent we find likewise a number of gifted poets. The two anthologies “Deutsch in Amerika” (Chicago, 1892) and “Vom Lande des Sternenbanners” (Ellenville, N. Y., 1905) contain many contributions of Dorothea Boettcher, Elizabeth Mesch, Edna Fern, Amalie von Ende, Marianne Kuenhold, Maria Raible, Minna Kleeberg, Bella Fiebing, Henni Hubel, Martha Toeplitz, and others, distinguished in form as well as rich in imagination and powerful in expression. Several German-American women also became favorably known by valuable works in prose, as for instance Therese Albertine Louise Jacob, the wife of Professor Robinson, of New York. Under the name of Talvj, she wrote historical works about Captain John Smith and the colonization of New England, and a “Historical Review of the Language and Literature of the Slavic Nations, with a Sketch of their Popular Poetry.” Of her many poems and translations Goethe spoke with great admiration. Her novels are far superior to the average in style and interest.
In the Netherlands the novels of Elizabeth Bekker were extremely popular at the end of the 18th Century. She ranks high among Dutch authors. Her “Historie van William Levend,” the “Historie van Sara Burgerhart,” “Abraham Blankaart” and “Cornelia Wildshut” are her greatest works. The poems of Agathe Dekken are to this day esteemed masterpieces of Dutch poetry. During the 19th Century Mrs. Bosboom-Toussaint’s novels, and Helen Swarth’s poems “Passiebloemen” have been widely read.
The most eminent woman writer of Denmark was Thomasine Kristine Baroness Gyllembourg-Ehrensvärd, who introduced into Danish literature a novel vein of realism and domestic humor. Although she has had many imitators, she is still without a rival. Hadda Raonkilde has exerted a powerful influence upon Scandinavian literature.
The two most successful women-novelists of Norway are Anna Magdalene Thoresen and Jacobine Camilla Collet, author of the excellent novel “Amtmandens Döttre” (“The Governor’s Daughters”). In 1894 all Norway celebrated her eightieth birthday as a national holiday.
The most eminent Swedish novelist of the 19th Century was Frederika Bremer. Her “Sketches of Every Day Life” attracted immediate attention. But this success was far surpassed by the novels “The H—— Family” and “The Neighbors.” Both manifest the author’s purity, simplicity, and love of domestic life. These books as well as almost all of the author’s later works have been translated into English, German and French.
Another Swedish author of note was Anne Charlotte Edgren. Of Emily Carlen’s novels “The Rose of Thistle Island” and “The Magic Goblet” are most appreciated. Anna Maria Lenngren belongs likewise to the most popular Swedish writers. The Swedish Academy ordered a medal cast in her honor. And of the Swedish authors of the 20th Century Selma Lagerloef was in 1909 awarded the Nobel Prize for her beautiful modern saga “Goesta Berling.”
Finland and Poland too have noteworthy women-writers. Finland, “Country of the thousand lakes,” was the birth-place of Sarah Wacklin, Wilhelmina Nordström and Helen Westermark. The literature of Poland was enriched by the poems and novels of Elizabeth Jaraczewska, Lucya Rautenstrauss, Narcyza Zwichowska and Comtesse Mostowska.
Spain has produced in modern times several remarkable woman authors: Gertrudis de Avellaneda, Maria de Pinar-Sinues, and Angela Grassi. Italy has the excellent novelists Rosa Taddei, Francesca Lutti, Matilda Serao, Grazia Pierantoni-Mancini, Fanny Zampini-Salazar, and the Marchesa Vincenza de Felice-Lancellotti. Furthermore Ada Negri, one of the most powerful poets of all times.
Having glanced at woman’s part in world’s literature, a few words should be said about women journalists. During the middle of the last century the publishers of several leading newspapers of England and America, desiring to infuse new life into their papers, added a number of women to their staffs. The complete success of this experiment was confirmed by the rapid increase in the number of such women journalists. Whereas in 1845 England had only 15 of them, this number grew to more than 800 in 1891. In the United States the number increased from 350 in 1889 to 2193 in 1910. Many of these women journalists received careful training in the special schools of journalism at the universities of New York, Philadelphia, and elsewhere.
Jeannette Gilder, herself a journalist, writes about her profession: “Woman as a mere fashion writer is a thing of the past. To-day she expects to rank with the man writer. In the future she will expect to be his superior, for a woman is not stationary in her ambitions, she likes variety. A man is wedded to his old clothes. He sighs when he has to throw aside the old and comfortably fitting coat for a new one not so comfortably fitting. A woman sighs when she has to wear an old dress. She would like fashions to change every week instead of every three months, as they do now. This love for variety in personal matters is carried into her professional life. If she reports a Salvation Army meeting to-day she hails with glee an opportunity to report an automobile race to-morrow. With boundless ambition, with adaptability, energy and a pleasing style, there is nothing to keep women from monopolizing the journalistic profession if they put their minds to it. The only trouble is they are apt to marry and leave the ranks. But, then there are others standing ready to fill the vacant places. In the next hundred years why may we not see all newspapers owned by women, edited by women, written by women, with women compositors and women pressmen. Already there is one such in France.”
