The folks over at The Classics Club recommend beginning the Women's Classic Event (I sort like the idea of calling it a "Challenge") by answering some questions about yourself. So here goes . . . Introduce yourself. Tell us what you are most looking forward to in this event. I teach American literature at the university level and my research interests are particularly…
I recently sent out my fifth newsletter, The Woolson and Alcott Chronicles. As I sat down to begin writing, I couldn't think of much "news." I had maybe two items of interest. Then gradually more came to me, including the first two reviews of Constance Fenimore Woolson: Portrait of a Lady Novelist, scheduled giveaways on Goodreads, and a reveal of the publisher for my…
Today I will revisit Rome, the final stop on my 2013 trip to walk in Woolson's footsteps in England and Italy. I visited the Forum, saw the Coliseum, and battled with the crowds at the Vatican. (I gave up when I leaned my head back to look up at the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel and got whacked in the head by another…
I've been reliving my trip to England and Italy to follow in Woolson's footsteps almost exactly 3 years ago. It was late October, early November, and the weather was cold and rainy pretty much nonstop. I had to buy extra layers to stay warm, but I was still freezing and wet most of the time. When I arrived in Florence, I discovered the…
I'm revisiting my trip of three years ago (almost exactly) to the sites in England and Italy where Woolson lived. You can see my first two posts about England here and here. I've been back to England again since, but Italy still haunts me. My first stop was Venice, the city that Woolson thought of as her Xanadu. Once I saw it in person, I…
I am revisiting my trip to follow in Constance Fenimore Woolson's footsteps almost exactly three years ago. My first stops were Salisbury and Wells, England, which I discussed in my last post. From Wells, via Bath, I visited Cheltenham, the spa town in which Woolson lived for about two years in 1890 and 1891. She was never happy there, so I didn't stay…
The back cover copy for Miss Grief and Other Stories is here: Discover the fiction of a writer once deemed America’s “Novelist Laureate.” Constance Fenimore Woolson (1840-94) was considered one of the best writers of her generation. She depicted with precise realism and great empathy a broad landscape of Americans and their ways, from the people of the rural Midwest and deep South…
Last week I learned that I will be receiving a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities to write my next book, Reading Little Women: The History of an American Classic. The grant comes from the NEH's new Public Scholar program, which generated some media attention, including this Washington Post article, in which I am quoted. I am thrilled to be able to…
I'm working on the copyedits of the manuscript now and am almost done. This is the time for scrutinizing every comma and hyphen. Here and there I add a phrase for clarity or delete a sentence that seems repetitive. But mostly it's making sure each name is spelled correctly. Today, however, I rediscovered for a moment the joy of research, when you are…
I have been trying for some time to articulate what I see as an important missing link to discussions about how to improve women's status in the literary world--namely, improving their profile in our understanding of the literary past. If students come out of college with little exposure to women writers, as they continue to do in large numbers, then it is no wonder they have a…