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4 - The Reign of the Dolls: Violence and the Nonhuman in Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
- Edited by Stephanie Palmer, Nottingham Trent University, Myrto Drizou, Boğaziçi Üniversitesi, Istanbul, Cécile Roudeau, Université Paris Cité
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- Book:
- New Perspectives on Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
- Published by:
- Edinburgh University Press
- Published online:
- 20 October 2023
- Print publication:
- 28 February 2023, pp 79-94
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Summary
When Edith Wharton wrote an introduction to Ethan Frome in 1922, eleven years after its original publication, she explained that she had written it because
the New England of fiction bore little—except a vague botanical and dialectical—resemblance to the harsh and beautiful land as I had seen it. Even the abundant enumeration of sweet-fern, asters and mountain laurel, and the conscientious reproduction of the vernacular, left me with the feeling that the outcropping granite had in both cases been overlooked. (1)
In her autobiography, A Backward Glance, Wharton explained that Ethan Frome treated “life as it really was … utterly unlike that seen through the rose-coloured spectacles of my predecessors, Mary Wilkins and Sarah Orne Jewett” (293). Wharton’s characterization of Freeman as drawing a world of “sweet-fern, asters and mountain laurel” through “rose-coloured spectacles,” though typical of her time, gravely underestimates Freeman’s portrayal of “granite outcroppings” by glossing over the underlying issues of poverty, isolation, and violence underlying much of Freeman’s fiction.
Wharton’s dismissive portrayal reflects some of the ways in which Freeman has been read by contemporaries and later critics. Praised by contemporaries such as W. D. Howells, but ignored in the era of modernism, Freeman’s work underwent a revival in the 1970s and 1980s beginning with the Feminist Press edition of The Revolt of Mother and Other Stories (1974) and Marjorie Pryse’s Selected Stories of Mary Wilkins Freeman (1983), both of which focused on feminist themes of women’s community and emphasized stories celebrating women’s transgressions as resistance to a patriarchal social order. As Mary Reichardt observed in her review of Freeman criticism through 1987, however, this selective focus limited the range of contexts in which to read Freeman. Changes in feminism and a less idealized, more complex vision of women’s relationships reveal a shift from “Freeman-the-feminist-communal activist” to “Freeman-the-Gothic-satirist.”
Notes on Contributors
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- By John Dennis Anderson, William Blazek, Linda Costanzo Cahir, Sharon Kehl Califano, Donna Campbell, Helena Chance, Melanie Dawson, Linda De Roche, Anne-Marie Evans, Susan Goodman, Jennifer Haytock, Adam Jabbur, Katherine Joslin, Pamela Knights, Heidi M. Kunz, Jessica Schubert McCarthy, Bonnie Shannon McMullen, Cecilia Macheski, Maureen E. Montgomery, Elsa Nettels, Julie Olin-Ammentorp, Emily J. Orlando, Robin Peel, Melissa M. Pennell, Laura Rattray, Judith P. Saunders, Sharon Shaloo, Gail D. Sinclair, Carol J. Singley, Margaret Toth, Gary Totten, Linda Wagner-Martin
- Edited by Laura Rattray, University of Hull
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- Book:
- Edith Wharton in Context
- Published online:
- 05 November 2012
- Print publication:
- 08 October 2012, pp ix-xvi
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Contributors
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- By Brian Abaluck, Imran M. Ahmed, Torbjörn Åkerstedt, Sonia Ancoli-Israel, Anna Anund, Donna L. Arand, Isabelle Arnulf, Fiona C. Baker, Thomas J. Balkin, Christian R. Baumann, Michel Billiard, Michael H. Bonnet, Meredith Broderick, Christian Cajochen, Scott S. Campbell, Sarah Laxhmi Chellappa, Fabio Cirignotta, Yves Dauvilliers, David F. Dinges, Christopher L. Drake, Neil T. Feldman, Catherine S. Fichten, Charles F. P. George, Namni Goel, Christian Guilleminault, Shelby F. Harris, Melinda L. Jackson, Joseph Kaleyias, Göran Kecklund, William D. S. Killgore, Sanjeev V. Kothare, Andrew D. Krystal, Clete A. Kushida, Luc Laberge, Gert Jan Lammers, Christopher P. Landrigan, Sandrine H. Launois, Patrick Levy, Eva Libman, Yinghui Low, Jennifer L. Martin, Una D. McCann, Renee Monderer, Patricia J. Murphy, Sona Nevsimalova, Seiji Nishino, Eric A. Nofzinger, Maurice M. Ohayon, Masashi Okuro, Jean-Louis Pepin, Fabio Pizza, Anil N. Rama, David B. Rye, Paula K. Schweitzer, Hideto Shinno, Renaud Tamsier, Michael J. Thorpy, Astrid van der Heide, Hans P. A. Van Dongen, Mari Viola-Saltzman, Jim Waterhouse, Nathaniel F. Watson, Rajive Zachariah
- Edited by Michael J. Thorpy, Michel Billiard
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- Book:
- Sleepiness
- Published online:
- 04 February 2011
- Print publication:
- 27 January 2011, pp vii-x
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Contributors
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- By Phillip L. Ackerman, Neil Anderson, Jens B. Asendorpf, R. Michael Bagby, Michael Harris Bond, Gregory J. Boyle, Andrea L. Briggs, Giles St J. Burch, Turhan Canli, David Canter, Gianvittorio Caprara, Charles S. Carver, Douglas F. Cellar, Gordon Claridge, Susan Cloninger, Elisabeth D. Conradt, Philip J. Corr, Sharon Dawe, Ian J. Deary, Boele De Raad, Edward L. Deci, Colin G. DeYoung, M. Brent Donnellan, Juris G. Draguns, Marko Elovainio, Aurelio José Figueredo, David C. Funder, Paul Gladden, Rapson Gomez, Samuel D. Gosling, Jeremy R. Gray, Robert D. Hare, B. Austin Harley, Edward Helmes, Robert Hogan, Lauri A. Jensen-Campbell, Daniel Nelson Jones, Mika Kivimäki, Jennifer M. Knack, James T. Lamiell, Natalie J. Loxton, Geoff MacDonald, Gerald Matthews, Robert R. McCrae, Mario Mikulincer, Stephanie N. Mullins-Sweatt, Marcus R. Munafò, Vickie Nam, Craig S. Newmann, Rainer Reisenzein, Madeline Rex-Lear, Richard W. Robins, Michael D. Robinson, Mary K. Rothbart, Richard M. Ryan, Gerard Saucier, Michael F. Scheier, Constantine Sedikides, Phillip R. Shaver, Brad E. Sheese, Yuichi Shoda, Ronald E. Smith, Alice F. Stuhlmacher, Rhonda Swickert, Avril Thorne, David D. Vachon, Geneva Vásquez, Michele Vecchione, Seth A. Wagerman, Fiona Warren, Hannelore Weber, Thomas A. Widiger, Pedro Sofio Abril Wolf, Donna Youngs, Moshe Zeidner
- Edited by Philip J. Corr, University of East Anglia, Gerald Matthews, University of Cincinnati
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- Book:
- The Cambridge Handbook of Personality Psychology
- Published online:
- 05 June 2012
- Print publication:
- 16 July 2009, pp xv-xvii
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Contributors
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- By Graham Allan, Donna M. Allen, Irwin Altman, Arthur Aron, Donald H. Baucom, Steven R. H. Beach, Ellen Berscheid, Rosemary Blieszner, Jeffrey Boase, Tyfany M. J. Boettcher, Barbara B. Brown, Abraham P. Buunk, Lorne Campbell, Daniel J. Canary, Rodney Cate, John P. Caughlin, Mahnaz Charania, Jennie Y. Chen, F. Scott Christopher, Jennifer A. Clarke, Marilyn Coleman, W. Andrew Collins, Michael K. Coolsen, Nathan R. Cottle, Carolyn E. Cutrona, Marianne Dainton, Valerian J. Derlega, Lisa M. Diamond, Pieternel Dijkstra, Steve Duck, Pearl A. Dykstra, Norman B. Epstein, Beverley Fehr, Frank D. Fincham, Helen E. Fisher, Julie Fitness, Garth J. O. Fletcher, Myron D. Friesen, Lawrence Ganong, Kelli A. Gardner, Jenny de Jong Gierveld, Robin Goodwin, Christine R. Gray, Kathryn Greene, David W. Harris, Willard W. Hartup, John H. Harvey, Kathi L. Heffner, Ted L. Huston, William J. Ickes, Emily A. Impett, Michael P. Johnson, Deborah J. Jones, Deborah A. Kashy, Janice K. Kiecolt‐Glaser, Jeffrey L. Kirchner, Brighid M. Kleinman, Galena H. Kline, Mark L. Knapp, Ascan Koerner, Jean‐Philippe Laurenceau, Kim Leon, Timothy J. Loving, Stephanie D. Madsen, Howard J. Markman, Alicia Mathews, Mario Mikulincer, Patricia Noller, Nickola C. Overall, Letitia Anne Peplau, Daniel Perlman, Sally Planalp, Urmila Pillay, Nicole D. Pleasant, Caryl E. Rusbult, Barbara R. Sarason, Irwin G. Sarason, Phillip R. Shaver, Alan L. Sillars, Jeffry A. Simpson, Susan Sprecher, Susan Stanton, Greg Strong, Catherine A. Surra, Anita L. Vangelisti, C. Arthur VanLear, Theo van Tilburg, Barry Wellman, Amy Wenzel, Carol M. Werner, Adam R. West, Sarah W. Whitton, Heike A. Winterheld
- Edited by Anita L. Vangelisti, University of Texas, Austin, Daniel Perlman, University of British Columbia, Vancouver
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- Book:
- The Cambridge Handbook of Personal Relationships
- Published online:
- 05 June 2012
- Print publication:
- 05 June 2006, pp xvii-xxii
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