Hungry Heart

by Williams, Gary

• ISBN13: 9781558491571
• ISBN10: 1558491570
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1999-02-01
• Publisher: Univ of Massachusetts Pr
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Summary

Hungry Heart reexamines the early literary career of Julia Ward Howe (1819-1910), best remembered as the author of "The Battle Hymn of the Republic". Combining biographical narrative with textual analysis, Gary Williams reconstructs Howe's emergence as a writer against the backdrop of her deeply troubled marriage to Boston philanthropist Samuel Gridley Howe. Among her early writings, Williams pays particular attention to Passion-Flowers, a celebrated yet controversial volume of poems published in 1854, as well as to an unpublished 400-page story that features a hermaphrodite as its protagonist. Williams shows how this latter work, startling in its bold exploration of sexual ambiguities, reflects Howe's effort to come to terms with her husband's intimate attachment to the prominent abolitionist Charles Sumner. The result is a fascinating cultural biography that not only enhances Howe's reputation as a writer but also enriches our understanding of the middle-class world of Victorian New England.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations	ix	(2)
Acknowledgments	xi
Introduction	1	(11)
ONE "The Thought of What I Have Undertaken Weighs upon Me" Early Writing and the Decision to Marry	12	(28)
TWO "Sumner Ought to Have Been a Woman" Learning to Live in a Triangulated Marriage	40	(26)
THREE "The Internal Fire That Consumes" The 1840s, Motherhood, and the Necessity of Writing	66	(40)
FOUR "Between Extremes Distraught and Rent" The Second Trip to Rome and the Seeds of Passion-Flowers	106	(28)
FIVE "Ye Shall Listen Now" Passion-Flowers and the Poetics of Defiance	134	(37)
SIX "Down the Bitter River She Dropped" Words for the Hour and The World's Own	171	(44)
Notes	215	(54)
Index	269