Sarah Orne Jewett, Deephaven (1877).
I can understand why Truman Capote told Willa Cather that Sarah Orne Jewett wrote “one good book,” The Country of the Pointed Firs. But Deephaven is a remarkable book: a picture of female friendship — partnership, really — in a faded fishing village.
Related reading
All OCA Sarah Orne Jewett posts
[Cather thought that The Country of the Pointed Firs was one of three American works of literature likely to have a long life. The other two: The Scarlet Letter and Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.]
Thursday, October 10, 2024
“Unflavored dulness”
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
comments: 6
Thanks for the link to Willa Cather’s preface. Ms. Jewett is now on the list for the next trip to the library. — Heber
Happy reading!
Who published the edition you're reading? I don't think Jewett has been well-served by the publishing business. Some of her best stories are hard to find, and even the Library of America edition is incomplete. We live in Jewett country now, as it happens.
I have the Library of America volume, but I don’t like the thin paper for reading, so I downloaded an 1877 copy from Google Books and read on a iPad. I don’t know her work beyond the two novels I’ve read, but there’s a lot of her fiction in Google Books, all full view, including two volumes of stories chosen by Cather.
In addition to Pointed Firs, my favorite stories of hers are "A White Heron" and "The Grey Mills of Farley." My recollection is that the LOA has one of the two. I found an illustrated edition of Deephaven in our library this morning. I think it's a reprint of an 1893 edition.
Thanks for the recommendations, Chris. I’ll seek out those two. I’m glad they didn’t discard Deephaven.
Post a Comment