Stories and novel excerpts highlight the attractions and perils of vacationing in 19th-century New England.
Book Description
Editorial Reviews
From Library Journal
This collection of previously published materials by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Edith Wharton, Sinclair Lewis, and others includes both short stories and excerpts from longer works. Editor Brown's (history, Univ. of Vermont; Inventing New England: Regional Tourism in the 19th Century) introduction is both well written and intelligent, providing historical background and including exceptional analysis of the writings. The selections are logically arranged, but many of them are too short to provide the reader with much insight into the topic. Since these stories can be found elsewhere, most of the book's value lies in the introduction. Brown would perhaps have been better off writing a book of literary and historical analysis instead, like her previous work. For comprehensive social history collections only.AKathleen A. Shanahan, Kensington, MD
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Kirkus Reviews
Not only has the way of travel in New England changed since 1820 but so has the way of writing about it. In Brown's selections of descriptive tales by Hawthorne, Harriet Beecher Stowe, William Dean Howells, Sarah Orne Jewett, Edith Wharton, Edward Bellamy and Sinclair Lewis, among other less well known contributors, we can also follow the advance of clear writing and a turning away from the quaint and curious turns of speech garnered from English models. As Brown points out, only the well-heeled vacationer, for the better part of the century, could travel to New England. Not until the end of the 1800's could shopkeepers, bank clerks, schoolteachers and the like afford short vacations for traveling. Description of such adventures, however, called not only for the language of the sublime but also for gentility, elegance, imagination, and even heartfelt emotional responses to all things scenic, such stances and attitudes adapted, say, from Byron or paintings of the Italian landscape masters. Brown divides her selections into ``the uses of scenery,'' ``pleasure and danger at New England resorts,'' and ``a visit to old New England.'' Among the standouts is Sinclair Lewiss limning of Babbitt's return to Zenith after his second trip to Maine (solo and a failure), in which he discovers that he can not run away from Zenith ``because in his own brain he bore the office and the family and every street and disquiet and illusion of Zenith.'' Pleasure, darkness, and disaster made altogether enjoyable. -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
Product Details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
Customer Reviews
|
There are no customer reviews yet.
|
|||
|
Video reviews
|
Tag this product(What's this?)Think of a tag as a keyword or label you consider is strongly related to this product.
Tags will help all customers organize and find favorite items. |
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
