Excellent Women, Anne Sexton, and a Doll; Her Kind

918studio releases Throne fiction debut: Her Kind LECLAIRE, IOWA — March 18, 2013 — 918studio announced today the release of a debut novel from author, professor, and small press publisher, Robin Throne. Her Kind, a novel was inspired by Anne Sexton's famous poem of the same name, and is an epistolary novel of an unassuming matriarch who chronicles a family migration from England to the new England to Iowa, and the settlement of the lost river village of Parkhurst (now part of historic Le Claire). Throne was also named the recipient of the fourth David R. Collins' Literary Achievement Award March 16 at the Midwest Writing Center's Literary Banquet at the Outing Club in Davenport. Past recipients have included notable local authors, Sean Leary, Michael McCarty, and Connie Corcoran Wilson. Her Kind, a novel is available for purchase at the Midwest Writing Center, Artswork in Le Claire, The Book Rack in Davenport and Moline, Book World in Southpark Mall, and Prairie Lights in Iowa City. The Kindle version is available from Amazon.com. Past releases from 918studio have included Nancy Ann Schaefer's In Search of Lode (2012), The Legend of Tug Fest and other LeClaire Ghost Stories (2012), Jane VanVooren Rogers' How to avoid being and other paths to Triumph (2011), and Ellen Tsagaris' Sappho, I should have listened (2011). For more about 918studio, visit www.918studio.net

An Apologia for Countess Erzebet Bathory: The Laugh of the Medusa and Erzebet Bathory

Below is an editorial from my blog on Erzebet Bathory Medusa the Gorgon.  Two not-so excellent women, yet maybe more excellent than we know.


An Apologia for Countess Erzebet Bathory: The Laugh of the Medusa and Erzebet Bathory: Of Medusa:   Medusa is of course, the Greek myth’s female monster with wings, scaly body and claws, and snakes for hair.   She is morta...

Dr. E's Doll Museum Blog: With Love from Tin Lizzie; A History of Metal Doll...

Dr. E's Doll Museum Blog: With Love from Tin Lizzie; A History of Metal Doll...: See Below: Results 1-1 of 1 User Review - Flag as inappropriate We all have our own personal history shaped by the dolls that were p...

Dr. E's Doll Museum Blog: With Love from Tin Lizzie; A History of Metal Doll...

Dr. E's Doll Museum Blog: With Love from Tin Lizzie; A History of Metal Doll...: See Below: Results 1-1 of 1 User Review - Flag as inappropriate We all have our own personal history shaped by the dolls that were p...

An Apologia for Countess Erzebet Bathory: Letters and Infamous Ladies in a Dandelion Garden

An Apologia for Countess Erzebet Bathory: Letters and Infamous Ladies in a Dandelion Garden: The Private Letters of Erzebet Báthory by Kimberly Craft   Infamous Lady by Kimberly Craft   Dandelions in the Garden by Charlie C...

A Study of Marmee

Marmee and Louisa, The Untold Story of Louisa May Alcott and her Mother by Eve La Ҏlante. Free press  Illustrated 368 pages.

 

My Heart is Boundless: Writings of Abigail May Alcott, Louisa’s Mother Ed. by Eve La Ҏlante. 250 pages..

 

It is telling that the author must include in the second book the subtitle, “Louisa’s Mother”, for many of us do not know the real name of the beloved Marmee of Little Women.

 

Brenda Wineaṕṕle reviews both books for the NY Times Review of Books, Dec. 23, 2012. 

 

Both books address the role of Marmee as breadwinner, an  “excellent woman” who takes on the role of head of household while her “feckless” transcendentalist husband Bronson engages in one money losing scheme after another.  But, we who read LW know this; Mr. Alcott is the ultimate absent father, though Alcott  chooses to soften his irresponsibility by sending him to the Civil War to end is a prisoner of the confederates.

 

According to the reviewer,  both books address the role of mothers to women, especially historical authors, which is often overlooked.  Alcott is more often described as the daughter of “Bronson Alcott,” and not as the daughter of Abigail May Alcott, just as the role of Rev. Bronte is emphasized in biographies of Charlotte, Anne, and Emily.   Abigail Alcott was in her own right an important woman, from a good Bostonian Family, who “married down” and who learned poverty first hand from her husband,  who described himself as “an Idea without Hands,” and who declared “Sacrifices must be made.”  In other words, as Wineaṕṕle and  La Ҏlante. Point out, the sacrifices were all Marmees.   Also, as both indicate, it is possible to read between the lives in LW and other Alcott books to see the frustration, rivalry and resentment of the women involved.   As Abigail is to have said, “Woman lives her thoughts; Man speculates about it” 

 

Abigail chose two wrestle the Angel of the House by beating her at her own game.  She took in all kinds of work, all within the gender expectations  for women of the day, but fruitful nevertheless.  Abigail kept the family going; she, not Bronson headed the family.  She was an excellent woman that was art tea brewer in a crisis, and art warrior woman.

 

For those of us who have lost our mothers, and who realizes their importance in our lives, and the void, because no one loves us, likes us, or does things for us as our mothers did, the life of Abigail Alcott is particularly poignant and significant.

 

 

 

 

 

Dr. E's Doll Museum Blog: I will be Back; Finishing a Book

Dr. E's Doll Museum Blog: I will be Back; Finishing a Book: So, I will return, as my Gen. Macarthur doll might say. LOL!. More musings, and then a very brief hiatus. The competition factor involved ...