Introduction
Keyword(s):
This Introduction describes the presence and absence of nineteenth-century American women’s poetry, both then and now; situates this book’s approach and method within the field of feminist recovery work, looking closely at the central role that subjectivity has played in past efforts to define the field; and explains how and why a study of conventions can provide a necessary intervention at this moment in nineteenth-century poetry studies. It articulates an argument for why the field should turn away from what is exceptional (namely, a study of individual women writers) and towards what might be seen as commonplace (namely, the conventions that those women employed).
Keyword(s):