The First Woman in the Republic

Carolyn L. Karcher is Professor of English, American Studies, and Women’s Studies at Temple University.

Illustrations ix

Preface and Acknowledgments xi

Chronology xix

Abbreviations xxvi

Prologue: A Passion for Books 1

1. The Author of Hobomok 16

2. Rebels and "Rivals": Self Portraits of a Conflicted Young Artist 38

3. The Juvenile Miscellany: The Creation of an American Children's Literature 57

4. A Marriage of True Minds: Espousing the Indian Cause 80

5. Blighted Prospects: Indian Fiction and Domestic Reality 101

6. The Frugal Housewife: Financial Worries and Domestic Advice 126

7. Children's Literature and Antislavery: Conservative Medium, Radical Message 151

8. "The First Woman in the Republic": An Antislavery Baptism 173

9. An Antislavery Marriage: Careers at Cross Purposes 195

10. The Conditions of Women: Double Binds, Unresolved Conflicts 214

11. Schisms, Personal and Political 249

12. The National Anti-Slavery Standard: Family Newspaper or Factional Organ? 267

13. Letters from New York: The Invention of a New Literary Genre 295

14. Sexuality and Marriage in Fact and Fiction 320

15. The Progress of Religious Ideas: A "Pilgrimage of Pennance" 356

16. Autumnal Leaves: Reconsecrated Partnerships, Personal and Political 384

17. The Example of John Brown 416

18. Child's Civil War 443

19. Visions of a Reconstructed America: The Freedmen's Book and A Romance of the Republic 487

20. A Radical Old Age 532

21. Aspirations of the World 573

Afterword 608

Notes 617

Works of Lydia Maria Child 757

Index 773