Lecyure
1145 mots
5 pages
Anonymous: no moreTo Wade Fleming
Eng 119 B
November 25, 2010
By Kim Kuntz
Anonymous: no more
Life in the 18th Century was a lot different from life as we know it today. Many things were done for obvious or different reasons. Authors of that era had a particular approach to authorship of literary works. The novel The Female American or The Adventures of Unca Eliza Winkfield is a good example, being that the book is written by an anonymous writer. In week 8 of the lecture, Professor Hron asked: “who is the author; was it a woman or was it a man?” Throughout the book, many elements indicate that a female writer could be the creator. In this study, I will observe different aspects that may persuade the reader to believe that a woman is responsible of producing the work. The question of authorship is, without a doubt, the most relevant aspect, followed by the sentimentalism and feminism in this fictional work.
The author of The Female American chose to stay anonymous for many reasons. In the 18th century, a woman’s rights were practically non-existent and well defined by men. At the time of colonialism, where men were conquering and discovering new worlds, women were moving and making a new life for their families in this new world. Many of the books written at this time were about women in a domestic sphere and not about women taking control of their lives and being in power. The knowledge of the identity of an author plays a big part in how the book is perceived and a lot of our appreciation is based on our perception of who wrote it. In “The story of the story” by Em Adyron, we, as students, read the text with a certain understanding. With a little bit of research on the author, we found out that our professor M. Hron was indeed the author, which changed our comprehension or understanding of the text. The same can be said about The Female American, where, if the readers knew it was written by a woman, the work would