For the most part, I have enjoyed reading your book and learning about the history of print culture, the growth of the media, and why the United States is so exceptional. However, your claim that the “major writers of the era” are “Nathaniel Hawthorne, Herman Melville, Emerson, Edgar Allan Poe, and Walt Whitman” (137) is misogynistic claptrap.
You state that they are “genuine” writers who wrote “enduring literature” (137). You completely disregard best-selling authors in the antebellum period and merely allude to them as "popular authors” – because they are women. This is not only irresponsible but also aggravating for those of us who missed authors like Harriet Beecher Stowe and Maria Cummins and their delightful girl-power novels like The Hidden Hand, Ruth Hall, and The Lamp Lighter. Not until going to graduate school did I meet these authors. Instead, in high school I had to read Moby Dick and The Scarlet Letter – novels that not only bored me but reinforced negative stereotypes about women and people of color, while privileging male experience. When you ignore women writers you effectively add to the attempts to silence and erase them and their works. Instead, you have validated male writers that were irritated by the “scribbling women” who outsold and outranked them in popular culture.
To rectify that erasure, I will circulate the names of only a few of those “popular” women writers in this blog. These women inspired the so-called “enduring literature” of these male writers with their “'new rhetorical strategies'” (137). They are:
Louisa May Alcott,
Catharine Beecher,
Alice Cary,
Lydia Maria Child,
Maria Susanna Cummins,
Mary Andrews Denison,
Fanny Fern,
Hannah Foster,
Grace Greenwood,
Sarah Josepha Hale,
Marion Harland,
Caroline Hentz,
Eliza Leslie ,
Elizabeth Oakes Smith,
Elizabeth Stuart Phelps,
Lydia Sigourney,
Harriet Beecher Stowe,
E.D.E.N. Southworth, and
Susan Warner.
I can recommend any of these authors as more entertaining than Hawthorne, Melville, or any of their colleagues. Give them a try.
Sincerely,
Ms. Asaeli
Ms. Asaeli
P.S. Read these posts for further enlightenment: “From One Writer To Another: Shut Up, V.S. Naipaul” by Diana Abu-Jaber, http://www.npr.org/2011/06/03/136919974/from-one-writer-to-another-shut-up-v-s-naipaul; “The 10 Most Powerful Women Authors” by Avril David, http://www.forbes.com/sites/avrildavid/2011/06/06/the-10-most-powerful-women-authors/; and “250 Books By Women All Men Should Read” by Brian, http://www.joylandmagazine.com/brian/blog/250_books_women_all_men_should_read. Enjoy!
Hi Larisa, lovely post--you made me laugh. Starr obviously is neither a cultural or literary historian, or he would have known Hawthorne's attack on "those scribbling women" was a response to his being eclipsed in sales and popularity be the women authors of the period. He might also have known that most people did not even know Melville was a writer, as few readers took the time to read his books. -Moby Dick- was not well received, and readers found Melville's publications after -MD- even stranger. I fear Starr's lack of background in the literature of the period makes him an easy target. But -The Scarlet Letter- is still an interesting book. You know, you just might consider writing Starr in reality and asking why he overlooked the women authors.
ReplyDeleteI did find the Scarlet Letter an interesting read as a teenager.
ReplyDeleteI was just going to post that you should write Mr. Starr for real...I see Dr. W has suggested it as well. I noticed the lack of women myself....I also noticed that in most cases he blathered on and on, but failed to name any authors or titles beyond the ones you mentioned. Naughty Starr!
ReplyDeleteLarisa, I, too, loved your post and strongly encourage sending Starr a real letter with your query.
ReplyDeleteFor the record, I chuckled when Starr included Melville in his list--Moby Dick (and most everything else he wrote, minus a few early works) was obsolete until the modernists revived it! I've actually never read Moby Dick, BUT I would encourage you to see Moby Dick: The Musical (It's a Whale of a Tale!) should it ever come to town. It's amazing. I think "Bartleby, the Scrivener" would be better tolerated by high school students--my college students certainly found it mildly amusing (high praise from them). "I'd prefer not to" really is a phrase for the ages.
Hi, Larisa,
ReplyDeleteSpot on! I found myself referencing Starr's choice selections as a reinforcement of the "boy's club" mentality, and I would imagine that most critical readers would take issue with Starr. Dr. Williams makes a good point that Starr's lack of knowledge on literature of the period makes him a target, and in my opinion, you provided a very nice tongue and check response. I wonder if he would write you back or acknowledge this shortcoming in his text?
See you in class!
Callie