W. D. Howells (1837-1920) occupies a peculiar position in our current literary history. Situated on the periphery, he is one of whose marginality seems, nevertheless, to be a necessary counterpart to the centrality of other writers--such as his friends Henry James and mark Twin--who are more securely fixed in the canon. Paradoxically, Howells has been an indispensable man in the middle, linking such binary pairs as East/West, romance/realism, elitism/socialism, patriarchal canon/women writers. This volume brings together nine related essays by John W. Crowley. The first four center respectively on Howells and the Civil War, his attitudes toward women, his friendship with a homosexual writer, and the tragically short life of his daughter Winifred. Crowley's overarching purpose here is to establish Howells as perhaps the representative male writer of his time, within the gender codes of Victorian America. The last five chapters discuss Howell's later fiction, focusing on its intense concern with psychology an psychic phenomena. Crowley not only brings this relatively neglected work more fully into view, but also argues that Howells used the writing of this fiction as a process of psychological self-healing that resembles the self-analysis of Sigmund Freud during the same years.
- ISBN13 9781558497511
- Publish Date 7 October 2009
- Publish Status Out of Print
- Out of Print 14 March 2021
- Publish Country US
- Imprint University of Massachusetts Press
- Format Paperback
- Pages 284
- Language English