To Herland and Beyond (Magill’s Literary Annual 1991-2005)
At a glance:
- Author: Ann J. Lane
- First Published: 1990
- Type of Work: Literary biography
- Time of Work: 1860-1935
- Setting: New England, New York, and California
- Principal Characters: Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Walter Stetson, Silas Weir Mitchell, Houghton “Ho” Gilman, Katharine Chamberlin
- Genres: Criticism, Nonfiction, History, Biography
- Subjects: Culture, Journalism or journalists, Politics, Psychology or psychologists, Authors or writers, Literature, Social issues, Abandoned children, Feminism, Lectures or lecturing
- Locales: California, New York, New England
The subtitle of this biography of Charlotte Perkins Gilman reflects Ann I Lane’s twin focus on the life and work of her subject, but Lane’s approach is hardly conventional. From her perspective, Gilman’s life is also a “work,” a product “created,” consciously and unconsciously (for Lane is Freudian in her reading of Gilman’s life and art), by an early feminist. Moreover, Lane does not narrowly define Gilman’s “work” as literary, though she was a prolific writer, but as the total contribution of a woman whose life and work were one. Lane departs from biographical...
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