From Page to Place: American Literary Tourism and the Afterlives of Authors

by Jennifer Harris (Editor), Hilary Iris Lowe (Editor)

Overview

Literary tourism has existed in the United States since at least the early nineteenth century, and now includes sites in almost every corner of the country. From Page to Place examines how Americans have taken up this form of tourism, offering an investigation of the places and practices of literary tourism from literary scholars, historians, tour guides, and collectors. The essays here begin to trace for the first time the histories of some of these sites, the rituals associated with literary tourism, and the ways readers and visitors consume popular literature through touristic endeavors.

In addition to the editors, contributors include Rebecca Rego Barry, Susann Bishop, Ben de Bruyn, Erin Hazard, Caroline Hellman, Michelle McClellan, Mara Scanlon, and Klara-Stephanie Szlezák.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781613764688
Publisher:	University of Massachusetts Press
Publication date:	06/29/2018
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	256
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

Jennifer Harris is associate professor of literature at the University of Waterloo and coeditor of the Norton Critical edition of The Coquette and the Boarding School. Hilary Iris Lowe is director of the Center for Public History and assistant professor of history at Temple University. She is author of Mark Twain Houses and American Literary Tourism.

Table of Contents

Contents

Acknowledgments vii

Introduction 1

Jennifer Harris and Hilary Iris Lowe

1. The Eighteenth-­Century Author No One Knows and Other Problems: Promoting Jupiter Hammon on Long Island 21

Jennifer Harris

2. “Step forth and again take up its magic pen”: The Author’s House

as Informal Memorial 46

Erin Hazard

3. Keeping (the Spirit of) Thoreau Alive in Concord: Reflections on Diversity and Innovation in American Literary Tourism 67

Klara-­Stephanie Szlezák

4. The Wide, Wide World beyond a Tiny, Deserted Island: At Home with Susan and Anna Warner 88

Rebecca Rego Barry

5. “Afoot with my vision”: Whitmania and Tourism in the

Digital Age 107

Mara Scanlon

6. Commemorating Writers’ Workplaces: The Case of Mark Twain’s Study and Quarry Farm 125

Hilary Iris Lowe

7. “Shut not your doors to me, proud libraries!”: The Repatriation of Edith Wharton’s Library 146

Caroline Hellman

8. Making a Little House: Literary Tourism at Rocky Ridge Farm 163

Michelle McClellan

9. Author Homes in Coffee Table Books: Half-­Reading, Literary

Décor, and the Good Life 182

Ben De Bruyn

10. The Allure of American Authors’ Homes: Surveying Nineteenth-­

and Twentieth-­Century Literary Guides 205

Appendix: A Bibliography of Guides for Literary Tourists 223

Susann Bishop

Notes on Contributors 231

Index 233

What People are Saying About This

Gregory Pfitzer

From Page to Place reminds readers that the reputations of works of literature (like the mythologies that often inspire them) are not static or concretized once they have gone out of print or their authors have passed away but rise and fall with the vicissitudes of altering interpretive paradigms in accordance with changing cultural priorities.

Editorial Reviews

"From Page to Place reminds readers that the reputations of works of literature (like the mythologies that often inspire them) are not static or concretized once they have gone out of print or their authors have passed away but rise and fall with the vicissitudes of altering interpretive paradigms in accordance with changing cultural priorities."—Gregory Pfitzer, author of History Repeating Itself: The Republication of Children's Historical Literature and the Christian Right

From the Publisher