The Writings Of Hesba Stretton

Highly respected as a writer by critics and commentators, Hesba Stretton (1832-1911) was a vigorous campaigner for the rights of oppressed minorities and a founding member of the London Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. Though she is known today primarily as a writer of evangelical fiction for young people, including Jessica's First Prayer, this characterization fails to acknowledge the extensive range of her writings and social activism. Elaine Lomax re-examines Stretton's writing for children and adults, situating her body of work within the broad social and cultural context of its production to expose the depth and complexity of Stretton's engagement with contemporary ideas, debates, and discourses. Mining nineteenth-century periodicals, archival materials, and the minutes of the Religious Tract Society, as well as Stretton's own revealing log books, Lomax demonstrates Stretton's preoccupation with those at the bottom or on the margins of society. At the same time, she advances our understanding of the intersection of cultural and literary representations of the child and childhood with wider images of the colonized or excluded, and our knowledge of the history and development of juvenile literature and women's writing.

Highly respected as a writer by critics and commentators, Hesba Stretton (1832-1911) was a vigorous campaigner for the rights of oppressed minorities and a founding member of the London Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. Though she is known today primarily as a writer of evangelical fiction for young people, including Jessica's First Prayer, this characterization fails to acknowledge the extensive range of her writings and social activism. Elaine Lomax re-examines Stretton's writing for children and adults, situating her body of work within the broad social and cultural context of its production to expose the depth and complexity of Stretton's engagement with contemporary ideas, debates, and discourses. Mining nineteenth-century periodicals, archival materials, and the minutes of the Religious Tract Society, as well as Stretton's own revealing log books, Lomax demonstrates Stretton's preoccupation with those at the bottom or on the margins of society. At the same time, she advances our understanding of the intersection of cultural and literary representations of the child and childhood with wider images of the colonized or excluded, and our knowledge of the history and development of juvenile literature and women's writing.

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This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. To ensure a quality reading experience, this work has been proofread and republished using a format that seamlessly blends the original graphical elements with text in an easy-to-read typeface. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

Ruth Medway, a Christian mother, brooded over her eight children who had left home. Ishmael, her beloved ninth child, took the schoolmistress' daughter to a cave and roasted some wild eggs. The unusual consequences of this event shaped his life greatly. "Where can we find a home again, mother?" he asked at last; "there's no place like home." "Up there " she said, lifting her dim eyes to the great sky above them; "if God gives us no other home here in this world, He's got one ready there for thee and me." "Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father's house are many mansions; I go to prepare a place for you."-John 14:1, 2.

Hesba Stretton (1832-1911) was the pseudonym of Sarah Smith, an English author of children's literature. She is considered one of the most popular Evangelical writers in the nineteenth century. Her moral tales and semi-religious stories, chiefly for the young, were printed in huge quantities, and were widespread as school and Sunday school prizes. She used her Christian principles as a protest against specific social evils in her children's books. An excerpt reads, "Mrs., Bolton could not escape her share of these troubles; though she never accused herself for a moment as having had any part in causing them. It was the archdeacon who had obtained the living of Upton for her favorite nephew; and she had settled there to be the patroness of every good thing in the parish. Mr. Chantrey's popularity had been a source of great satisfaction and self-applause to her. She had foreseen how useful he would be; what a shining light in this somewhat dark corner of the church. The increasing congregations, and the number of carriages at the church-door, had given her much pleasure."