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Sherwood Bonner

(Redirected from Katherine Sherwood Bonner MacDowell)

Introduction

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Katherine[1] Sherwood Bonner McDowell (February 26, 1849 – July 22, 1883) was an American author and feminist during America's Gilded Age. She is also known by her pen name, Sherwood Bonner.

Born in Holly Springs, Mississippi, on February 26, 1849, into a wealthy family that experienced financial decline during the American Civil War, Bonner chose to leave her husband and child to pursue her literary ambitions.

Childhood and Early life

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[2][3] Her father, an Irish immigrant, married the daughter of a wealthy plantation family during the antebellum period. However, the Bonner family's fortunes declined during the Civil War when their home was occupied by Union soldiers.[4][5] A childhood of privilege gave way to an early womanhood of decreased possibilities and increased financial strain.[5] Despite her literary inclinations, societal norms limited her options to marriage.[3]

According to Bonner's scrapbook, her first story, "Laura Capello: A Leaf from a Traveller’s Note Book", was published in the Boston Ploughman when she was 15.[3] However, Anne Razey Gowdy's edited edition of one of Bonner's samplers states that the story wasn't published until 1869, shortly before Bonner turned 20.[6]

At age 21, she married Edward McDowell on Valentine's Day (February 14), 1871.[4][7]

The Road to Boston

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After marriage, Bonner moved to Texas with her husband and gave birth to a daughter, Lilian, on December 10.[2][4][7] Edward McDowell, however, was unable to support his wife financially, prompting Bonner to return to Holly Springs with her daughter.[4][8]

In September 1873, Bonner left her daughter in her mother-in-law's care and took a train to Boston, calling upon her acquaintance Nahum Capen, who helped her enroll in a local school.[4][9][10]

Early literary Career

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Capen employed her as his personal secretary while he worked on History of Democracy.[5] She then began working as a secretary to Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.[11] Under Capen and Longfellow's sponsorship, Bonner began publishing stories in Harper’s Young People, The Atlantic Monthly and The Youth’s Companion.[11] Longfellow became Bonner's lifelong patron.[2]

Bonner was Longfellow's editorial assistant on Poems of Places.[4] In 1876, Bonner toured England and Europe with novelist Louise Chandler Moulton and wrote travel articles that were published in the Boston Times and the Memphis, Tennessee, Avalanche.[4] After writing articles about her European travels, and with Longfellow's support, Bonner published her only novel, Like unto Like, in 1878.[4][12]

Literary Works

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Bonner was known for her articles that discussed local stories, in which she is said to skillfully handle the "strange dialect and negro humor".[4][13] Many of her stories focused on her "gran'mammy", a character based on the woman who cared for Bonner as a child.[3] Bonner's stories of Southern life were not tinged with bitterness over the victory of the North in the Civil War, rather she viewed the war as the crisis of the nation as a whole.[14] Her works of note include Dialect Tales, Like unto Like, and Suwanee River Tales.[4] Like unto Like is Bonner's only novel and is considered to be semi-autobiographical.[15][16]

Last Years

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In 1878, a Yellow fever epidemic struck Holly Springs, infecting Bonner's father and brother.[2][17] She returned home to care for them before their deaths.[17]

She established residency in Illinois and divorced Edward McDowell in 1881. Also in 1881, Bonner was diagnosed with advanced breast cancer and was told she had only a year to live.[5] Wanting to leave her mark on the literary world and a financial legacy for her daughter and aunt, Bonner hid her illness from all but her closest of friends and threw herself into her work. Bonner was dictating a novel up until four days before she died at age 34 in Holly Springs on July 22, 1883.[17]

Legacy

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Professor Claude Simpson posits that Bonner had the potential to become a great literary figure if she had not died. Simpson's anthology The Local Colorists includes one of Bonner's short stories in it. Literary editor Anne Razey Gowdy remarks on Bonner's versatility and writes on Bonner's potential direction as a writer if she were to continue to live.[18][19]

References

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  1. ^ Sometimes transcribed as Catherine or Katharine
  2. ^ a b c d Ference, Audrey (April 11, 2018). "Cedarhurst Is a Southern Gothic Dream in Mississippi for Just $272K". seattlepi.com. Retrieved October 20, 2021.
  3. ^ a b c d Bondurant, Alexander Lee (1899). Sherwood Bonner, Her Life and Place in the Literature of the South. p. 45.
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j McDowell, Katherine Sherwood Bonner (2000). A Sherwood Bonner Sampler, 1869-1884: What a Bright, Educated, Witty, Lively, Snappy Young Woman Can Say on a Variety of Topics. Univ. of Tennessee Press. pp. xiv–xxxv. ISBN 978-1-57233-067-2.
  5. ^ a b c d Lives of Mississippi Authors, 1817-1967. Univ. Press of Mississippi. 1981. pp. 46–48. ISBN 978-1-61703-418-3.
  6. ^ McDowell, Katherine Sherwood Bonner (2000). A Sherwood Bonner Sampler, 1869-1884: What a Bright, Educated, Witty, Lively, Snappy Young Woman Can Say on a Variety of Topics. Univ. of Tennessee Press. ISBN 978-1-57233-067-2.
  7. ^ a b Bondurant, Alexander Lee (1899). Sherwood Bonner, Her Life and Place in the Literature of the South. pp. 47–48.
  8. ^ Bondurant, Alexander Lee (1899). Sherwood Bonner, Her Life and Place in the Literature of the South. pp. 47–48.
  9. ^ WILLIAMS, SUSAN S. (2008). "Forwarding Literary Interests: James Redpath and the Authorial Careers of Marion Harland, Louisa May Alcott, and Sherwood Bonner". Legacy. 25 (2): 262–274. doi:10.1353/leg.0.0039. JSTOR 25679659. S2CID 144776207.
  10. ^ "Sherwood Bonner achieved early fame". Newspapers.com. June 8, 1986. Retrieved October 25, 2021.
  11. ^ a b Lives of Mississippi Authors, 1817-1967. Univ. Press of Mississippi. 1981. pp. 46–48. ISBN 978-1-61703-418-3.
  12. ^ Ewell, Barbara C.; Menke, Pamela Glenn; Humphrey, Andrea (2002). Southern Local Color: Stories of Region, Race, and Gender. University of Georgia Press. p. 64. ISBN 978-0-8203-2317-6.
  13. ^ Bonner, Sherwood (1990). Dialect Tales and Other Stories. Rowman & Littlefield. pp. xix. ISBN 978-0-8084-0427-9.
  14. ^ McDowell, Katherine Sherwood Bonner (2000). A Sherwood Bonner Sampler, 1869-1884: What a Bright, Educated, Witty, Lively, Snappy Young Woman Can Say on a Variety of Topics. Univ. of Tennessee Press. pp. xlix-2. ISBN 978-1-57233-067-2.
  15. ^ American National Biography, February 1, 2000
  16. ^ Bonner, Sherwood (1990). Frank, William (ed.). Dialect Tales and Other Stories. Rowman & Littlefield. pp. xviii. ISBN 978-0-8084-0427-9.
  17. ^ a b c "Sherwood Bonner". Newspapers.com. August 11, 1883. Retrieved October 25, 2021.
  18. ^ Bonner, Sherwood; McDowell, Katherine Sherwood Bonner (1990). Dialect Tales and Other Stories. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 1. ISBN 978-0-8084-0427-9.
  19. ^ McDowell, Katherine Sherwood Bonner (2000). A Sherwood Bonner Sampler, 1869-1884: What a Bright, Educated, Witty, Lively, Snappy Young Woman Can Say on a Variety of Topics. Univ. of Tennessee Press. p. iii. ISBN 978-1-57233-067-2.

Sources

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  • McAlexander, Hubert Horton, The Prodigal Daughter: A Biography of Sherwood Bonner (Baton Rouge, Louisiana State University Press, 1981).
  • Frank, William, L., Sherwood Bonner (Catherine McDowell), (Boston, Twayne Publishers, 1976).
  • Frank, William, L., "Sherwood Bonner" in American National Biography Online database.
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