SOURCE: DeVries, James H. “The Tradition of the Sentimental Novel in The Garies and Their Friends.” CLA Journal 17, no. 2 (December 1973): 241-49.

In the following essay, DeVries argues that Webb's examination of Northern racism in The Garies and Their Friends is thematically incompatible with the conventions of the sentimental novel.

First published in London in 1857, Frank J. Webb's The Garies and Their Friends is the second novel written by a black American and the first to consider the problems of free blacks in a Northern city. This pre-Civil War novel generally ignores the evils of slavery and instead focuses on the malevolence of Northern racism. In her “Preface” to The Garies Harriet Beecher Stowe recommends “… this simple and truthfully-told story to the attention and interest of the friends of progress and humanity in England.” This indicates that Webb probably wrote the novel for a readership similar to that of...