The Altar at Home: Sentimental Literature and Nineteenth-Century American Religion

Author:   Claudia Stokes
Publisher:   University of Pennsylvania Press
ISBN:  

9780812246377


Pages:   296
Publication Date:   15 September 2014
Format:   Hardback
Availability:   In stock   Availability explained
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The Altar at Home: Sentimental Literature and Nineteenth-Century American Religion


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Overview

Displays of devout religious faith are very much in evidence in nineteenth-century sentimental novels such as Uncle Tom's Cabin and Little Women, but the precise theological nature of this piety has been little examined. In the first dedicated study of the religious contents of sentimental literature, Claudia Stokes counters the long-standing characterization of sentimental piety as blandly nondescript and demonstrates that these works were in fact groundbreaking, assertive, and highly specific in their theological recommendations and endorsements. The Altar at Home explores the many religious contexts and contents of sentimental literature of the American nineteenth century, from the growth of Methodism in the Second Great Awakening and popular millennialism to the developing theologies of Mormonism and Christian Science. Through analysis of numerous contemporary religious debates, Stokes demonstrates how sentimental writers, rather than offering simple depictions of domesticity, instead manipulated these scenes to advocate for divergent new beliefs and bolster their own religious authority. On the one hand, the comforting rhetoric of domesticity provided a subtle cover for sentimental writers to advance controversial new beliefs, practices, and causes such as Methodism, revivalism, feminist theology, and even the legitimacy of female clergy. On the other hand, sentimentality enabled women writers to bolster and affirm their own suitability for positions of public religious leadership, thereby violating the same domestic enclosure lauded by the texts. The Altar at Home offers a fascinating new historical perspective on the dynamic role sentimental literature played in the development of innumerable new religious movements and practices, many of which remain popular today.

Full Product Details

Author:   Claudia Stokes
Publisher:   University of Pennsylvania Press
Imprint:   University of Pennsylvania Press
Dimensions:   Width: 15.20cm , Height: 3.00cm , Length: 22.90cm
Weight:   0.544kg
ISBN:  

9780812246377


ISBN 10:   0812246373
Pages:   296
Publication Date:   15 September 2014
Audience:   College/higher education ,  Tertiary & Higher Education
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   In stock   Availability explained
We have confirmation that this item is in stock with the supplier. It will be ordered in for you and dispatched immediately.

Table of Contents

Introduction Chapter 1. Revivals of Sentiment: Sentimentalism and the Second Great Awakening Chapter 2. My Kingdom: Sentimentalism and the Refinement of Hymnody Chapter 3. The Christian Plot: Stowe, Millennialism, and Narrative Form Chapter 4. Derelict Daughters and Polygamous Wives: Mormonism and the Uses of Sentiment Chapter 5. The Mother Church: Mary Baker Eddy and the Practice of Sentimentalism Notes Bibliography Index Acknowledgments

Reviews

"""Claudia Stokes presents a more textured account and provocatively mixed assessment of the sentimental tradition of American women's letters than we have yet encountered."" * Tracy Fessenden, Arizona State University * ""This is an excellent book-well researched, innovative, and beautifully written. Claudia Stokes shows a mastery of both literary sentimentalism and religious history, which she uses to bring out compelling new insights about what it meant for women to draw on sentimental codes as they forged new ways of participating in religious culture and public discussions."" * Nancy Bentley, University of Pennsylvania *"


Claudia Stokes presents a more textured account and provocatively mixed assessment of the sentimental tradition of American women's letters than we have yet encountered. -Tracy Fessenden, Arizona State University This is an excellent book-well researched, innovative, and beautifully written. Claudia Stokes shows a mastery of both literary sentimentalism and religious history, which she uses to bring out compelling new insights about what it meant for women to draw on sentimental codes as they forged new ways of participating in religious culture and public discussions. -Nancy Bentley, University of Pennsylvania


Author Information

Claudia Stokes is Associate Professor of English at Trinity University. She is the author of Writers in Retrospect: The Rise of American Literary History, 1875-1910 and coeditor of American Literary Studies: A Methodological Reader.

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