SOURCE: “Caroline M. Kirkland: Additions to the Canon” in Bulletin of Research in the Humanities, Vol. 86, No. 3, 1983-85, pp. 338-46.

In the following essay, Roberts discusses Kirkland's letters and the value they add to understanding her as an author and an individual.

During the heyday of the sentimental scribblers Caroline Kirkland pioneered as a literary realist. Kirkland, eschewing tears, idle tears, recorded with humor and candor America's achievements and shortcomings in mid-nineteenth century.¹ Now with the help of Kirkland's letters, several additions to her canon have come to light: a clever poem, “An Intercepted Letter to Dickens,” in Graham's; three burlesque sketches, “Notes for the Biography of a Distinguée,” published anonymously in Yankee Doodle; and some satiric comments on “The American Ideal Woman” for Putnam's.² All five pieces enhance her reputation.

Kirkland, born in 1801, spent her youth and young womanhood in New York state. But it was...