"Informative and stimulating. . . . Nina Baym has undertaken a systematic analysis of that nineteenth-century American fiction normally dismissed as at best trivially sentimental. . . . Woman's Fiction offers a fresh perspective on a largely forgotten body of literature."--American Literature "Perceives in the fiction of, by, and for women in the period stated a popular genre that made a particular kind of feminist avowal for the times, one that rejected the concept of helplessness and urged the application of intelligence and courage to trying situations. . . . Baym marshals ample supporting evidence from the outpouring of such fiction."--ALA Booklist

"Informative and stimulating. . . . Nina Baym has undertaken a systematic analysis of that nineteenth-century American fiction normally dismissed as at best trivially sentimental. . . . Woman's Fiction offers a fresh perspective on a largely forgotten body of literature."--American Literature "Perceives in the fiction of, by, and for women in the period stated a popular genre that made a particular kind of feminist avowal for the times, one that rejected the concept of helplessness and urged the application of intelligence and courage to trying situations. . . . Baym marshals ample supporting evidence from the outpouring of such fiction."--ALA Booklist

"Informative and stimulating. . . . Nina Baym has undertaken a systematic analysis of that nineteenth-century American fiction normally dismissed as at best trivially sentimental. . . . Woman's Fiction offers a fresh perspective on a largely forgotten body of literature."--American Literature "Perceives in the fiction of, by, and for women in the period stated a popular genre that made a particular kind of feminist avowal for the times, one that rejected the concept of helplessness and urged the application of intelligence and courage to trying situations. . . . Baym marshals ample supporting evidence from the outpouring of such fiction."--ALA Booklist