Prodigal Daughters: Susanna Rowson's Early American Women (review)

Marion Rust opens Prodigal Daughters: Susanna Rowson's Early American Women with a letter from Susanna Rowson to her former pupil, Miss Louisa Bliss. Writing in 1808, Rowson articulates her fears regarding impending war with Britain and lambastes the Jefferson Administration for the Embargo Act. Rowson, describing her own city on the hill, extols the benefits of international trade: America can only "profit by the great advantages an extensive commerce affords and by degrees the social arts will rise into perfection . . . the now imperial cities on the other side [of] the Atlantic, like Troy Carthage Greece and Rome are sunk into insignificance" (3). Rowson's prophetic letter foreshadows in a number of important ways the exciting work that Prodigal Daughters performs. First, the letter and Prodigal Daughters, in general, challenge the popular idea of Rowson as a mere purveyor of the sentimental novel. To Miss Bliss, Rowson discusses the benefits of international commerce for her adopted country, and in so doing, she reveals her knowledge of presidential policy and politics. Immediately, Rust forces her readers to look beyond the tears and tragedy most commonly associated with Rowson. Second, the letter, written to a former student, reminds us of Rowson's varied occupations. Throughout Prodigal Daughters, Rust introduces us to Rowson's many roles in the new republic as preceptress of the Young Ladies' Academy, actress in the Chesnut Street Theatre, editor of The Boston Weekly Magazine, and song writer of "America, Commerce, and Freedom." Rust's close attention to Rowson's other occupations and genres redefines Rowson from an early American sentimental novelist to a career woman firmly entrenched in late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century culture. Third, the letter is an example of Rust's careful archival research of the Rowson Papers at the University of Virginia; Rust includes readers' marginal comments, anonymous reviews, pamphlets, report cards, catalogues, and a wealth of notes, letters, memoirs, and articles written by Rowson and her peers, all of which richly inform Rust's portrayal of Rowson's work and life.

Rust opens with Rowson's letter to Miss Bliss because it illustrates so wonderfully her central thesis. According to Rust, Rowson, throughout her long authorial career, practices a "facility of adaptation" where she pays "explicit tribute to paternalistic hierarchies" and yet "depart[s] from [these] behavioral norms" (15, 21). Rust argues that Rowson thrived in reconciling the varied tensions pertaining to her identity as a non-native American female author living in the new republic. For example, before Rowson engages her former student in a discussion on the "spirit of commerce," Rust observes that Rowson cunningly asks, "What thinks your good father of the present times?" (2). Rowson's question to Mr. Bliss and her ensuing conversation with his daughter show the tension between the author's compliance with patriarchal power and her clear challenge to such power. According to Rust, Rowson creates "tentative, tenuous, but momentarily inhabitable readerly spaces within which her female contemporaries could construct themselves as fully empowered subjects" (13). Rust follows Rowson's success at creating such spaces throughout her large and diverse oeuvre, which she labels a "series of experiments . . . which continually builds upon the premise that authority may be wrested from post Revolutionary norms of female citizenship" (44). Prodigal Daughters, then, is a linear study of Rowson's novels, plays, poems, and other writings, beginning with Charlotte Temple's "suicidal passivity (in 1791)" and closing with "Lucy Temple's lifesaving decision to enter the teaching profession (in 1824)" (44).

Perhaps one of the most interesting places where we see Rust's thesis applied is in her discussions of Rowson's national identity. Rust reminds readers that Rowson is one of the most fascinating transatlantic figures of the new republic. In her analysis of Mentoria, Trials of the Human Heart, and the Young Ladies' Academy, Rust shows how Rowson capitalized upon her transatlantic identity, never disavowing her British roots to her American readership and pupils. According to...