(no subject)

I have finally gotten round to A Jury Of Her Peers, a history of American women's writing, thanks to finding it on the shelves at New Library. I'm enjoying it quite a lot so far -- it's literary history rather than literary criticism, but I think it does a good job of presenting a feminist perspective but not a narrowly ideological one. (Sentimental domestic novels of the 19th century: feminist because written by women? Not feminist because they were so strongly focused on stereotypical women's concerns? Bad on aesthetic grounds? Important as pop culture, even if not important as literature? Hopelessly tainted by racism and imperialism? The author raises all of these concerns without the need to come down firmly on any particular side.

But I think my favorite part so far has been learning that Walt Whitman wrote anonymous positive reviews of his own poetry. Oh, Walt Whitman, don't do that! That's for young and unwise authors of fanfiction, and authors of self-published vampire novels with the heads of movie stars pasted on the cover!

I do realize that Leaves of Grass was self-published. I do not believe it contains vampires.

As the author noted: "I celebrate myself," indeed.