A dramatic pose...

6 April 2024: Most of her poses are dramatic. Resting her head on a Mary Wilkins Freeman book just kicks it up a notch.

I sure do love this girl. 

"to go into stories..."

2 April 2024: Came across this excerpt from a letter Mary Wilkins Freeman wrote to Sarah Orne Jewett: "I suppose it seems to you as it does to me that everything you have heard, seen, or done, since you opened your eyes to the world, is coming back to you sooner or later, to go into stories" (qtd. in Glasser 1). I just love the idea of these two writers talking about their work.

Work Cited

Glasser, Leah Blatt. In a Closet Hidden: The Life and Work of Mary E. Wilkins Freeman. U of Massachusetts P, 1996.

"Why don't you think more of Mary Wilkins?"

30 March 2024: Just obsessed with this passage from Sylvia Townsend Warner: "If I had the courage of my convictions downstairs, when everyone was talking about Joyce and Pound and melting pots, I would have said, 'Why don't you think more of Mary Wilkins?'" 

I think I saved the entry on Freeman until this point because everything about it feels big to me: the things I want to say, the idea of limiting those remarks, my feelings for her work. So consider me a strong co-sign for Warner's question: why don't you think more of Mary Wilkins? 

Work Cited

Warner, Sylvia Townsend. "Item, One Empty House." Critical Essays on Mary Wilkins Freeman, edited by Shirley Marchalonis, G.K. Hall, 1991, pp. 118-31. 

"The Revolt of Mother" and "A New England Nun"

1 November 2022: Had a blast today talking about two Mary Wilkins Freeman stories with the GWST class. They are a great group this semester--very understanding of nuance and enthusiastic about the material. It's been a joy working with them.

"folks ahead with lanterns..."

31 March 2021: "'Sarah,' said Abby, solemnly, 'what's got to come has got to. You've got to look at things reasonable. There's two of us, an' one would have to go before the other one; we've always known it. It ain't goin' to be so bad as you think. Mis' Dunbar is comin' here to live with you. I've got it all fixed with her. She's real strong, an' she can make up the fires, an' git the water an' the tubs. You're fifty years old, an' you're goin' to have some more years to live. But it's just goin' to be gittin' up one day after another an' goin' to bed at night, an' they'll be gone. It can be got through with. There's roads trod out through everything, an' there's folks ahead with lanterns, as it were...'" --Mary Wilkins Freeman, "Two Friends"

Found myself fighting back tears reading this passage in my ENGL 301 class today. Big emotions all week. Almost too much, but the Lord also sends moments of light (people with lanterns, even if they don't know it), for which I am so grateful. 

"The Revolt of 'Mother'"

12 February 2018: "Nobility of character manifests itself at loop-holes when it is not provided with large doors." --Mary Wilkins Freeman, "The Revolt of 'Mother'"

We discussed this story (and Freeman's "A New England Nun") today in my ENGL 360 class. I love both stories and the students responded to them quite well. At the end of class, a student held up her highlighted copy of the piece and said, "This was my favorite line." It is one that hadn't stood out to me before, but I really this bit of Freeman's wit.

Death of Mary Wilkins Freeman

A poignant blog post over at The American Literary Blog on Mary Wilkins Freeman, who died on this day back in 1930. I've taught quite a bit of Freeman in my classes this semester and find her work richly rewarding. Her characters (like Louisa Ellis and Old Woman Magoun, just to name a couple) stick with a reader.

(Sorry for a pretty in-eloquent post that does little to convey my admiration for this writer! Blame "revision brain," as a I continue to slog through that article I mentioned yesterday.)