Woman's work in America

by Unknown

As Mrs. Samuel Gilman, Caroline Howard, of whom we have already spoken, carried the New England spirit into a Southern home, and there wrote not only verses, but sketches and tales, much in the manner of her sisters, who never left the Puritan nest; though dealing at times with material strange to them, as in her “Recollections of a Southern Matron.” With the women of New England lies our chief concern, until a date comparatively recent. A strong, thinking, working race,—all know the type; granite rock, out of its crevices the unexpected harebells trembling here and there. As writers they have a general resemblance; in one case a little more mica and glitter, in another more harebells than usual. Mrs. Sigourney, for instance, presents an azure predominance of the flowery, on a basis of the practical. Think of her fifty-seven volumes—copious verse, religious and sentimental; sketches of travel; didactic “Letters” to mothers, to young ladies; the charmingly garrulous “Letters of Life,” published after her death. Quantity, dilution, diffusiveness, the dispersion of energy in a variety of aims,—these were the order of the day. Lydia Maria Child wrote more than thirty-five books and pamphlets, beginning with the apotheosis of the aboriginal American in romance, ending in the good fight with slavery, and taking in by the way domestic economy, the progress of religious ideas, and the Athens of Pericles, somewhat romanticized. Firm granite here, not without ferns of tenderest grace. It is very curious and impressive, the self-reliant dignity with which these noble matrons circumambulate the whole field of literature, with errant feet, but with a character central and composed. They are “something better than their verse,” and also than their prose. Why was it that the dispersive tendency of the time showed itself especially in the literary effort of women? Perhaps the scattering, haphazard kind of education then commonly bestowed upon girls helped to bring about such a condition of things. Efficient work, in literature as in other professions, is dependent, in a degree, upon preparation; not indeed upon the actual amount of knowledge possessed, but upon the training of the mind to sure action, and the vitality of the spark of intellectual life communicated in early days. To the desultory and aimless education of girls at this period, and their continual servitude to the sampler, all will testify. “My education,” says Mrs. Gilman, “was exceedingly irregular, a perpetual passing from school to school.... I drew a very little and worked ‘The Babes in the Wood’ on white satin, with floss silk.” By and by, however, she “was initiated into Latin,” studied Watts’s Logic by herself, and joined a private class in French. Lydia Huntley (Mrs. Sigourney), fared somewhat better; pursuing mathematics, though she admits that too little time was accorded to the subject; and being instructed in “the belles-lettres studies” by competent teachers. Her day-school education ceased at thirteen; she afterward worked alone over history and mental philosophy, had tutors in Latin and French, and even dipped into Hebrew, under clerical guidance. This has a deceptively advanced sound; we are to learn presently that she was sent away to boarding-school, where she applied herself to—“embroidery of historical scenes, filigree, and other finger-works.” (May we not find a connection between this kind of training, and the production of dramatic characters as lifelike as those figures in floss silk? Was it not a natural result, that corresponding “embroidery of historical scenes” performed by the feminine pen?) Lydia Maria Francis (Mrs. Child) “apart from her brother’s companionship, had, as usual, a very unequal share of educational opportunities; attending only the public schools”—the public schools of the century in its teens—“with one year at a private seminary.” She writes to the Rev. Convers Francis in 1838, “If I possessed your knowledge, it seems to me as if I could move the whole world. I am often amused and surprised to think how many things I have attempted to do with my scanty stock of learning.” Catherine Sedgwick, “reared in an atmosphere of high intelligence,” still confesses, “I have all my life felt the want of more systematic training.”

Another cause of the scattering, unmethodical supply may have been the vagueness of the demand. America was not quite sure what it was proper to expect of “the female writer”; and perhaps that lady herself had a lingering feudal idea that she could hold literary territory only on condition of stout pen-service in the cause of the domestic virtues and pudding. “In those days,” says Thomas Wentworth Higginson, “it seemed to be held necessary for American women to work their passage into literature by first compiling a cookery-book.” Thus we have Mrs. Child’s “Frugal Housewife”; and we find clever Eliza Leslie of Philadelphia, putting forth “Seventy-five Receipts,” before she ventures upon her humorous and satirical “Pencil Sketches.” The culinary tradition was carried on, somewhat later, by Catherine Beecher, with her “Domestic Receipt Book”; and we have indeed most modern instances, in the excellent “Common Sense Series” of the novelist “Marion Harland,” and in Mrs. Whitney’s “Just How.” Perhaps, however, it is not fancy that these wear the kitchen apron with a difference.

In addition to lack of training, and to the vague nature of the public demand, a third cause operated against symmetrical artistic development among the women of those electric days preceding the Civil War. That struggle between the art-instinct and the desire for reform, which is not likely to cease entirely until the coming of the Golden Year, was then at its height. Both men and women were drawn into the maelstrom of the anti-slavery conflict; yet to a few men the artist’s single aim seemed still possible: to Longfellow, to Hawthorne. Similar examples are lacking among contemporary women. Essential womanhood, “das Ewigweibliche,” seems at this point unusually clear in the work of women; the passion for conduct, the enthusiasm for abstract justice, not less than the potential motherhood that yearns over all suffering.

The strong Hebraic element in the spiritual life of New England women, in particular, tended to withdraw them from the service of pure art at this period. “My natural inclinations,” wrote Lydia Maria Child, “drew me much more strongly toward literature and the arts than toward reform, and the weight of conscience was needed to turn the scale.”

Mrs. Child and Miss Sedgwick, chosen favorites of the public, stand forth as typical figures. Both have the art-instinct, both the desire for reform; in Mrs. Child the latter decidedly triumphs, in spite of her romances; in Miss Sedgwick, the former, though less decidedly, in spite of her incidental preachments. She wrote “without any purpose or hope to slay giants,” aiming merely “to supply mediocre readers with small moral hints on various subjects that come up in daily life.” It is interesting to note just what public favor meant, materially, to the most popular women writers of those days. Miss Sedgwick, at a time when she had reached high-water mark, wrote in reply to one who expected her to acquire a fortune, that she found it impossible to make much out of novel-writing while cheap editions of English novels filled the market. “I may go on,” she says, “earning a few hundred dollars a year, and precious few too.” One could not even earn the “precious few” without observing certain laws of silence. The “Appeal in Behalf of that class of Americans called Africans” seriously lessened the income of Mrs. Child. That dubious America of 1833 was decided on one point: this was not what she expected of “the female writer.” She was willing to be instructed by a woman—about the polishing of furniture and the education of daughters.

And now there arises before us another figure, of striking singularity and power. Margaret Fuller never appeared as a candidate for popular favor. On the polishing of furniture she was absolutely silent; nor, though she professed “high respect for those who ‘cook something good,’ and create and preserve fair order in houses,” did she ever fulfill the understood duty of woman by publishing a cookery-book. On the education of daughters she had, however, a vital word to say; demanding for them “a far wider and more generous culture.” Her own education had been of an exceptional character; she was fortunate in its depth and solidity, though unfortunate in the forcing process that had made her a hard student at six years old. Her equipment was superior to that of any American woman who had previously entered the field of literature; and hers was a powerful genius, but, by the irony of fate, a genius not prompt to clothe itself in the written word. As to the inspiration of her speech, all seem to agree; but one who knew her well has spoken of the “singular embarrassment and hesitation induced by the attempt to commit her thoughts to paper.” The reader of the Sibylline leaves she scattered about her in her strange career receives the constant impression of hampered power, of force that has never found its proper outlet. In “Woman in the Nineteenth Century,” there is certainly something of that “shoreless Asiatic dreaminess” complained of by Carlyle; but there are also to be found rich words, fit, like those of Emerson, for “gold nails in temples to hang trophies on.” The critical Scotchman himself subsequently owned that “some of her Papers are the undeniable utterances of a true heroic mind; altogether unique, so far as I know, among the Writing Women of this generation; rare enough, too, God knows, among the Writing Men.” She accomplished comparatively little that can be shown or reckoned. Her mission was “to free, arouse, dilate.” Those who immediately responded were few; and as the circle of her influence has widened through their lives, the source of the original impulse has been unnamed and forgotten. But if we are disposed to rank a fragmentary greatness above a narrow perfection, to value loftiness of aim more than the complete attainment of an inferior object, we must set Margaret Fuller, despite all errors of judgment, all faults of style, very high among the “Writing Women” of America. It is time that, ceasing to discuss her personal traits, we dwelt only upon the permanent and essential, in her whose mind was fixed upon the permanent, the essential. Her place in our literature is her own; it has not been filled, nor does it seem likely to be. The particular kind of force which she exhibited—in so far as it was not individual—stands a chance in our own day of being drawn into the educational field, now that the “wider and more generous culture” which she claimed has been accorded to women.

We may trace from the early publications of Lydia Maria Francis and Catherine Sedgwick the special line along which women have worked most successfully. It is in fiction that they have wrought with the greatest vigor and freedom; and in that important class of fiction which reflects faithfully the national life, broadly or in sectional phases. In 1821 Miss Francis, a girl of nineteen, wrote “Hobomok,” a rather crude novel of colonial Massachusetts, with an Indian hero. Those were the times of the pseudo-American school, the heyday of what Mr. Stedman has called the “supposititious Indian.” To the sanguine, “Hobomok” seemed to foreshadow a feminine Cooper; and its author put forth in the following year “The Rebels,” a novel of Boston before the Revolution. A more effective worker on this line, however, was Miss Sedgwick; whose “New England Tale”—a simple little story, originally intended as a tract—was published in 1822, and at once drew attention, in spite of a certain thinness, by its recognizable home flavor. The plain presentation of New England life in “Redwood,” her succeeding book, interests and convinces the reader of to-day. Some worthless elements of plot, now out of date, are introduced; but age cannot wither nor custom stale the fresh reality of the most memorable figure,—that manly soul Miss Deborah, a character as distinct as Scott himself could have made her. “Hope Leslie,” “Clarence,” and “The Linwoods” followed; then the briefer tales supplying “small moral hints,” such as the “Poor Rich Man and Rich Poor Man.” All are genuine, wholesome, deserving of the hearty welcome they received. “Wise, clear, and kindly,”—one must echo the verdict of Margaret Fuller on our gentle pioneer in native fiction; we may look back with pride on her “speech moderate and sane, but never palsied by fear or skeptical caution”; on herself, “a fine example of the independent and beneficent existence that intellect and character can give to woman.” The least studied among her pathetic scenes are admirable; and she displays some healthy humor, though not as much as her charming letters indicate that she possessed. A recent writer has ranked her work in one respect above that of Cooper, considering it more calculated to effect “the emancipation of the American mind from foreign types.”

Miss Sedgwick, past threescore, was still in the literary harness, when the woman who was destined to bring the novel of New England to a fuller development reached fame at a bound with “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.” At last the artist’s instinct and the purpose of the reformer were fused, as far as they are capable of fusion, in a story that still holds its reader, whether passive or protesting, with the grip of the master-hand. The inborn powers of Mrs. Stowe were fortunately developed in a home atmosphere that supplied deficiencies in training. Fate was kind in providing occasional stimulants for the feminine mind, though an adequate and regular supply was customarily withheld. Miss Sedgwick attributes an especial quickening force to the valuable selections read aloud by her father to his family; Miss Francis, as we have seen, owed much to the conversation of her brother. To Harriet Beecher was granted, outside her inspiring home circle, an extra stimulus, in the early influence of the enthusiastic teacher whose portrait she has given us in the Jonathan Rossiter of “Oldtown Folks.” A close knowledge of Scott’s novels from her girlhood had its effect in shaping her methods of narration. She knew her Bible—perpetual fountain feeding the noblest streams of English literature—as Ruskin knew his. Residence for years near the Ohio border had familiarized her with some of the darkest aspects of slavery; so that when the passage of the Fugitive Slave Law roused her to the task of exhibiting the system in operation, she was as fully prepared to execute that task as a woman of New England birth and traditions well could be. Since the war, Southern writers, producing with the ease of intimacy works steeped in the spirit of the South, have taught us much concerning negro character and manners, and have accustomed us to an accurate reproduction of dialect. The sublimity of Uncle Tom has been tried by the reality of the not less lovable Uncle Remus. But whatever blemishes or extravagances may appear to a critical eye in the great anti-slavery novel, it still beats with that intense life which nearly forty years ago awoke a deep responsive thrill in the repressed heart of the North. We are at present chiefly concerned with its immense practical success. It was a “shot heard round the world.” Ten thousand copies were sold in a few days; over three hundred thousand in a year; eight power-presses were kept running day and night to supply the continual demand. The British Museum now contains thirty-five complete editions in English; and translations exist in at least twenty different languages. “Never did any American work have such success!” exclaims Mrs. Child, in one of her enthusiastic letters.... “It has done much to command respect for the faculties of woman.” The influences are, indeed, broad and general, which have since that day removed all restrictions tending to impress inferiority on the woman writer, so that the distinction of sex is lost in the distinction of schools. Yet a special influence may be attributed to this single marked manifestation of force, to this imposing popular triumph. In the face of the fact that the one American book which had stormed Europe was the work of a woman, the old tone of patronage became ridiculous, the old sense of ordained and inevitable weakness on the part of “the female writer” became obsolete. Women henceforth, whatever their personal feelings in regard to the much-discussed book, were enabled, consciously or unconsciously, to hold the pen more firmly, to move it more freely.

In New England fiction, what a leap from the work of Miss Sedgwick, worthy as it is, to that of Mrs. Stowe! The field whence a few hardy growths were peeping, seems to have been overflowed by a fertilizing river, so rich is its new yield. It is the “soul of Down-East” that we find in “The Minister’s Wooing”” and “Oldtown Folks.” Things spiritual are grasped with the insight of kinship, externals are drawn with the certainty of life-long acquaintance. If we glance at the humorous side of the picture, surely no hand that ever wrought could have bettered one smile-provoking line in the familiar figure of Sam Lawson, the village do-nothing. There is a free-handedness in the treatment of this character, not often found in more recent conscientious studies of local types. It is a painting beside photographs. A certain inequality, it may be admitted, appears in the range of Mrs. Stowe’s productions. They form links, more or less shining, between a time of confused and groping effort on the part of women and a time of definitely directed aims, of a concentration that has, inevitably, its own drawbacks.

The encouragement of the great magazines, from the first friendly to women writers, is an important factor in their development. Harper’s dates from 1850; the Atlantic Monthly, in 1857, opened a new outlet for literary work of a high grade. Here appeared many of the short stories of Rose Terry, depicting the life of New England; unsurpassable in their fidelity to nature, their spontaneous flow, their grim humor, pathos, tragedy. In the pages of the Atlantic, too, suddenly flashed into sight the brilliant exotics of Harriet Prescott, who holds among American women a position as singular as that of Poe among men. Her characters have their being in some remote, gorgeous sunset-land; we feel that the Boston Common of “Azarian” is based upon a cloud rather than solid Yankee earth, and the author can scarce pluck a Mayflower but it turns at her touch to something rich and strange. Native flavor there is in some of her shorter stories, such as “The South Breaker,” and “Knitting Sale-Socks”; but a sudden waft of foreign spices is sure to mingle with the sea-wind or the inland lilac-scents. “The Amber Gods” and “A Thief in the Night” skillfully involve the reader in a dazzling web of deceptive strength.