The Peabody Sisters: Three Women Who Ignited American Romanticism
Elizabeth, Mary, and Sophia Peabody were in many ways our American Brontes. The story of these remarkable sisters — and their central role in shaping the thinking of their day — has never before been fully told. Twenty years in the making, Megan Marshall's monumental biograpy brings the era of creative ferment known as American Romanticism to new life. Elizabeth, the oldest sister, was a mind-on-fire thinker. A powerful influence on the great writers of the era — Emerson, Hawthorne, and...
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Fascinating, insightful, and wholly engrossing, The Peabody Sisters is a landmark biography of three women who made American intellectual history.Though theirs may not be household names, Elizabeth, Mary, and Sophia Peabody had an extraordinary influence on the thought of their day, the movement of intense creative ferment known as American Romanticism. Megan Marshall adeptly brings to life the sisters and the men they loved and inspired, including Ralph Waldo Emerson, Horace Mann, and Nathaniel Hawthorne. In a work filled with startling revelations, Marshall presents a vivid and nuanced psychological portrait of a sisterhood rife with shifting loyalties yet founded on enduring affection.The Washington Post - Gillian GillIn human history, many women of distinction and originality have given their thoughts and perceptions to the men they loved without thought of reward. Elizabeth, Mary and Sophia Peabody differ in that so many of their letters and diaries have come down to us. (Hawthorne, however, burned Sophia's letters.) Through Marshall's beautiful book, we can taste the flavor of three remarkable lives and pay tribute.
List of IllustrationsIXThe Peabody Family GenealogyXIIPrefaceXVPrologue: July 9, 18421Part IOrigins, 1746-18031Matriarch132Legacies173Seductions284"Belinda"395Flight into Union48Part IIThe Family School, 1804-18206"My Hopes All of Happiness"597Salem Girlhoods648The Doctor and His Wife829"Heretical Tendencies"8810"Beginning to Live"94Part IIIElizabeth, 1821-182411Lancaster10312Boston11813Maine133Part IVMary and Elizabeth, 1825-182814"I Am Always My Own Heroine"14715"There Is No Scandal in Brookline"15316"Life Is Too Interesting to Me Now"17117An Interior Revolution179Part VSophia, 1829-183218Dr. Walter18919"My Soul Steps Forth upon the Paper"20120"First Retreat into Solitude"21321"Scatteration"224Part VISomerset Court and La Recompensa, 1833-183522Chastity23723Blind Fair25724Cuba Journals271Part VII"Before the Age in Salem," 1836-183925Temple School Revisited30726Little Waldo, Jones Very, and the "Divinity School Address"32727The Sister Years349Part VIII13 West Street, Boston, 1840-184228Conversation37929"Mr. Ripley's Utopia"39930Two Funerals and a Wedding422Epilogue: May 1, 1843441Acknowledgments455Notes459Index581
\ Francine ProseTo write a group biography that also conveys the history of an era and a place is a massive enterprise, one that requires the writer to keep the threads of the story untangled even as the characters' lives overlap and converge. Marshall, a specialist in New England and women's history, has done a fine job of organizing and presenting excerpts from the voluminous letters (many of them previously undiscovered) and documents she located in the course of a project that took her almost two decades to complete.\ — The New York Times\ \ \ \ \ Gillian GillIn human history, many women of distinction and originality have given their thoughts and perceptions to the men they loved without thought of reward. Elizabeth, Mary and Sophia Peabody differ in that so many of their letters and diaries have come down to us. (Hawthorne, however, burned Sophia's letters.) Through Marshall's beautiful book, we can taste the flavor of three remarkable lives and pay tribute.\ — The Washington Post\ \ \ Library JournalWe really wouldn't have Emerson, Hawthorne, or any other Transcendentalists without the intervention of these three sisters. Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.\ \
