University Press of New England
Price: $29.95
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TIMOTHY KENSLEA discusses The Sedgwicks in Love: Courtship, Engagement, and Marriage in the Early Republic
Harvard Book Store is pleased to announce that on Friday, February 17th Timothy Kenslea will discuss his new book The Sedgwicks in Love: Courtship, Engagement, and Marriage in the Early Republic.
The Sedgwicks in Love examines the changing relationship between women and men in post-Revolutionary America, through the relationships of the seven brothers and sisters of one prominent Massachusetts family.
The Sedgwicks are an old Massachusetts family, whose ranks include Judge Theodore Sedgwick, an early speaker of the House of Representatives; Catharine Maria Sedgwick, one of the first female American novelists; Ellery Sedgwick, a longtime editor of the Atlantic Monthly; and Edie Sedgwick, the Andy Warhol protégée. They had arranged marriages and love matches, failed courtships and successful ones. A case of domestic violence reveals how limited a woman's options were if she wanted to end her marriage. A squabble over an inheritance reflected how severely women's property rights were restricted. There was a long engagement in which a couple exchanged nearly a hundred letters, carefully laying out their vision of their anticipated union. One sister chose to forego marriage in order to live the life she had envisioned for herself as a writer. This richly researched book is a fascinating portrait of evolving relationship between men and women in the early nineteenth century, as lived by one remarkable family.
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Timothy Kenslea is a history teacher at Norwell High School in Norwell, Massachusetts. He graduated from Yale University, has doctoral and master's degrees in history from Boston College, and edited high school and college textbooks for many years.
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