Point of View

According to Susanna Rowson's Preface, Charlotte Temple is a novel based on true facts, but with the names changed to protect the innocent—although all of the persons involved are said to be deceased. Rowson lives in the colonies during the American Revolution as a loyalist, is imprisoned briefly by the victors, and repatriated to England. Years later, she emigrates to the United States. She writes, therefore, about the times and places she has known well. Her purpose, however, is so narrowly moralistic that she fails to provide much detail about or flavor of those times and places.

Rowson writes explicitly to warn young women to avoid temptation to vice and to point out the inevitability of downfall and retribution. She makes numerous asides to the reader—and, she hopes, to their mothers who have diligently taken the time to read the novel before...