Most often, book clubs (aka book groups) choose recent publications for discussion, many straight off the current bestseller list. And this is understandable, given all the great books coming out. It’s hard enough to keep up with all the new publications, but can we make the case for discussions of classic literature by women authors?
Some suggestions in this post are by authors of the past that are still well known, while others have fallen under the literary radar. Either way, these novels make for fantastic reading and stimulating discussion. Books remain classics for a reason, after all.
With universal themes of what it means to be a woman — and what it means to be human — these great stories are timeless. Read More→
Harriet Ann Jacobs (February 11, 1813 – March 7, 1897) chronicled her life under enslavement in North Carolina and the constant sexual harassment by a prominent doctor.
She is alternately referred to as Harriet A. Jacobs (or simply Harriet Jacobs) and is today best known as the author of Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, an autobiographical narrative published privately in 1861. Read More→
Persuasion (1817) is the last novel that beloved British author Jane Austen completed; it was published six months after her death. Following is a sampling of quotes from Persuasion, a touching and engaging novel.
Persuasion may well be Austen’s most romantic story, and yet, as with her other works, it’s far from frivolous, exploring themes of lost love, missed opportunity, heartbreak, and becoming one’s own person.
Anne Elliot is twenty-seven when the story begins (an older heroine than is usual for this time and place). She’s a member of a family who suffers the indignity of having to lower their status as a way to get out of debt. At her age, a woman would have been considered well past the bloom of youth and on the road to spinsterhood.
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Gabriela Mistral, born Lucila Godoy Alcayaga (April 7, 1889 – January 10, 1957), was a Chilean poet, educator, diplomat, and feminist best known for being the first Latin American to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature.
She was awarded the prize “for her lyric poetry which, inspired by powerful emotions, has made her name a symbol of the idealistic aspirations of the entire Latin American world.”
In the Introduction to A Queer Mother for the Nation: The State and Gabriela Mistral (2002), Licia Fiol-Matta encapsulates the writer’s unique persona: Read More→
Shirley Jackson (December 14, 1916 – August 8, 1965) was an American author of fiction and nonfiction whose works influenced a generation of genre writers who came after her.
She was recognized for wryly humorous accounts of family life, and more significantly, sharply told stories and novels of psychological terror.
While Jackson remains best known for “The Lottery,” her widely anthologized 1948 short story, it would be a disservice to boil her career down to this controversial work that put her on the literary map. Read More→
Northanger Abbey was actually the first novel that Jane Austen completed with the hopes of publication, in 1803.The following quotes from Northanger Abbey reflect the fun Jane Austen had with her characters, though as always, it’s not just frivolous. She manages to imbue insightful commentary into every delightful line of text and dialog.
This early novel was first titled Susan. Jane’s family sold the copyright to a London publisher for a pittance. The publisher held on to it for years without printing it. It was tied up until 1816 when Jane’s brother Henry managed to buy it back.
Jane spent some time revising the original, renaming her heroine Catherine, but by the time it was published in 1817, she had died. That year, another of her novels, Persuasion, was published as well. Northanger Abbey is considered a coming-of-age novel in which Catherine Morland, the young and rather naïve heroine, learns the ways of the world. Read More→
Mansfield Park by Jane Austen (1814) is the third published novel by the esteemed British author. Here we’ll explore a selection of quotes from Mansfield Park, her third published novel.
Fanny Price, the novel’s main character, is sent by her impoverished family to be raised in the household of a wealthy aunt and uncle. The narrative follows her into adulthood and comments on class, family ties, marriage, the status of women, and even British colonialism.
The novel went through two editions before Austen’s death in 1817, but didn’t receive any public reviews until 1821. Critical reception for this novel, from that time forward, has been the most mixed among Austen’s works, and it’s considered her most controversial. Read More→
When The Shuttle by Frances Hodgson Burnett was published in 1907, she was already the successful author of Little Lord Fauntleroy, The Making of a Marchioness, A Little Princess, and some two dozen other books for children and adults.
In the course of her career, she produced more than forty novels. Of these, few but the children’s classics just mentioned, plus A Secret Garden, published in 1911, are still widely read.
In 2007 Persephone books republished The Shuttle, an entertaining story of American heiresses who marry English aristocrats. From the Persephone catalog: Read More→
