Ellen Glasgow and a Woman's Traditions

Book excerpt: Ellen Glasgow wrote and published nineteen novels as well as poems, short stories, essays, reviews, and an autobiography (published posthumously) in a career that spanned nearly fifty years. Until now, her writings have not been subject to feminist revaluation in the way that works of such writers as Charlotte Perkins Gilman or Willa Cather have been. In Ellen Glasgow and a Woman's Traditions Pamela R. Matthews initiates such a revaluation by taking into account not only Glasgow's gender and her perception of her role as a woman writer but the reader's gender and (mis)understanding of Glasgow. Using current feminist psychological theory, she assesses what Glasgow faced as a woman writer caught between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, examines the traditions in place at these times, and analyzes the influence on Glasgow of her female friendships. This shifting of critical perspective yields entirely new interpretations and closes the gap that has existed between standard criticisms of Glasgow and the effect that Glasgow has had on her readers.