Mark Twain in the Company of WomenThe field of Mark Twain biography has been dominated by men, and Samuel Clemens himself - riverboat pilot, Western correspondent, silver prospector, world traveler - has been traditionally portrayed as a man's man. The publication of Laura E. Skandera-Trombley's Mark Twain in the Company of Women, however, marks a significant departure from conventional scholarship. Skandera-Trombley, the first woman to write a scholarly biography of Mark Twain, contends that Clemens intentionally surrounded himself with women, and that his capacity to produce extended fictions had almost as much to do with the environment shaped by his female family as with the talent and genius of the writer himself. Women helped Clemens to define his boundaries, both personal and literary. Women shaped his life, edited his books, and provided models for his fictional characters. Clemens read and corresponded with female authors, and often actively promoted their careers. Skandera-Trombley seeks to combine a biographical study of Clemens's life with his beloved wife, Olivia (Livy) Langdon, and their three daughters, Susy, Clara, and Jean, with new readings of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc. Several crucial areas are investigated: the nature of Clemens's family participation in his writing process, the degree to which their experiences as women during the mid- and late nineteenth century affected his writing, and the extent to which the loss of his family may have impeded and ultimately ended his ability to write lengthy narratives. Skandera-Trombley points out that in marrying Livy, Clemens not only joined a family of substantial means, but also entered one active in thesuffragist, abolitionist, and other reformist movements, which had deep roots in the progressive community of Elmira, New York. Mark Twain in the Company of Women will be of interest to Twain scholars and readers as well as students in American studies, women's studies, nineteenth-century history, and political and cultural studies. |
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Adventures of Huckleberry Alice Hooker American Angelfish Anna Dickinson audience Autobiographical Dictation biography Brooks Catharine Beecher CCHS Charles Chemung County Clara Clem Clemens wrote Clemens's critical Daily Reminder daughter DeVoto dress Elmira Advertiser Elmira Female College father Frances Willard girls Hartford Hill Howells Huck Huckleberry Finn hydropathic Isabel Lyon Isabella Beecher Hooker Isabella Hooker Jane Clemens Jean Jervis Langdon Joan of Arc Julia Beecher Kaplan King Langdon family lecture Library literary Livy Lyon's Mark Twain Mark Twain's Letters marriage married Mary Fairbanks Memorial mother novel Olivia Langdon Olivia Langdon Clemens Olivia Lewis Olivia Lewis Langdon Olivia's death Paine Park Church Personal Recollections Pott's disease published Quarry Farm Rachael reading Recollections of Joan reform relationship role social story suffrage suffragist Susan Crane Susy Susy's death Taylor temperance Thomas Beecher tion views Water Cure WCTU woman women women's rights writing York young