SOURCE: Duus, Louise. “Neither Saint Nor Sinner: Women in Late Nineteenth-Century Fiction.” American Literary Realism 7, no. 3 (summer 1974): 276-78.

In the following essay, Duus suggests that realist fiction of the late nineteenth century allowed for more variety in the representation of women than previously possible.

In “Seduced and Abandoned in the New World,” Wendy Martin argues that American heroines, the daughters of Eve, “are destined to lives of dependency and servitude as well as to painful and sorrowful childbirth because, like their predecessor, they have dared to disregard authority or tradition in the search for wisdom or happiness.”¹ This generalization, like many generalizations about American fiction, proves out if one limits oneself to the novels of Cooper, Hawthorne, James, and Hemingway, but it necessitates ignoring a very large number of other writers, particularly those exploring new fictional modes in the late nineteenth century. While it is true that the...