Light In The Company Of Women

Sarsfield Middleton's mother is a wealthy West Virginian; his father is an eccentric, alcoholic Irishman. In the midst of radical social change, Sarsfield must choose between the sophisticated society circles of New York and the town of his childhood. He must also choose between the beautiful, pampered Julia and Emma, a charming shopkeeper. Set in the 19th century. Some strong language. 1993.

Light in the Company of Women was greeted with enthusiastic reviews when it was published in hardcover last year. This magnificent family saga captured the hearts of critics all across the country. Glittering with turn-of-the-century romance and history, Light in the Company of Women is the story of Sarsfield Middleton and his Raysburg, West Virginia, family. Sarsfield is a man searching for himself and his place in a turbulent, quickly changing society. Torn as he is between the genteel world women and the brutal, competitive male arena, the established "old" society and the nouveau riche, Sarsfield's choices in life and love are irrevocably divided between the comfortingly familiar and dangerously exciting. Elegantly written and studded w authentic period detail, Light in Company of Women is the perfect corn nation of style and substance.

New York Times Bestseller “I want to rip out every page of this glorious book and hang them on my wall so that I can be surrounded by these incredible women all day long.” —Emma Straub, New York Times bestselling author of The Vacationers and Modern Lovers Over 100 exceptional and influential women describe how they embraced their creative spirit, overcame adversity, and sparked a global movement of entrepreneurship. Media titans and ceramicists, hoteliers and tattoo artists, comedians and architects—taken together, these profiles paint a beautiful picture of what happens when we pursue our passions and dreams.

The field of Mark Twain biography has been dominated by men, and Samuel Clemens himself - riverboat pilot, Western correspondent, silver prospector, world traveler - has been traditionally portrayed as a man's man. The publication of Laura E. Skandera-Trombley's Mark Twain in the Company of Women, however, marks a significant departure from conventional scholarship. Skandera-Trombley, the first woman to write a scholarly biography of Mark Twain, contends that Clemens intentionally surrounded himself with women, and that his capacity to produce extended fictions had almost as much to do with the environment shaped by his female family as with the talent and genius of the writer himself. Women helped Clemens to define his boundaries, both personal and literary. Women shaped his life, edited his books, and provided models for his fictional characters. Clemens read and corresponded with female authors, and often actively promoted their careers. Skandera-Trombley seeks to combine a biographical study of Clemens's life with his beloved wife, Olivia (Livy) Langdon, and their three daughters, Susy, Clara, and Jean, with new readings of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc. Several crucial areas are investigated: the nature of Clemens's family participation in his writing process, the degree to which their experiences as women during the mid- and late nineteenth century affected his writing, and the extent to which the loss of his family may have impeded and ultimately ended his ability to write lengthy narratives. Skandera-Trombley points out that in marrying Livy, Clemens not only joined a family of substantial means, but also entered one active in thesuffragist, abolitionist, and other reformist movements, which had deep roots in the progressive community of Elmira, New York. Mark Twain in the Company of Women will be of interest to Twain scholars and readers as well as students in American studies, women's studies, nineteenth-century history, and political and cultural studies.

This fascinating book demonstrates the diversity of Connecticut’s women’s feminist activities in pre- and post-suffrage eras and refutes the notion that feminist activism died out with the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment.