Today we are very pleased to have jane turner with this, who is discussing her new biography. He was well known throughout america as the author of a scandalous novel and is a beauty who had married the air to heir to the astor family. Years earlier, she had burst from the literary scene with a short story in the Atlantic Monthly, a highly regarded illustrated monthly. In todays talk, jane will explore how she went from anonymity to a household name. She is a Professor Emeritus of history at george mason university, especially specializing in 19thcentury america and southern women. Her essays and articles have appeared in numerous journals, including the journal of southern history, the american journal of legal history, southern culture, and the american quarterly. In 2017 and 2018, she served as president of the american historical association. She is the author of several books including North Carolina planters and their children 18001860 and the reconstruction of southern womanhood, and most recently the subject of todays talk, the princess of albemarle, a melie rives. Please welcome jane turner sensor censer. Jane thank you for that lovely introduction. It is a pleasure to be in richmond, the city where amelie rives was born almost 160 years ago, and i o a special thanks to the museum for the invitation, and to the valentine museum, which has allowed me to use so many of the beautiful pictures of rives you will see here today and in my book. In 1891, article referred to her as the most noted of the younger writers of not only the south but of america. Only 28 years old, rives had already been publishing for five years. Most readers would have immediately recognized her name. Some of would have thought of her scandalous bestseller, the quicker the dead, and others would have pointed to her short stories. Others would have anecdotes about her beauty and headstrong behavior. As the daughter of a railroad executive and granddaughter of u. S. Senator from virginia, rives had a privileged life. She married two times, one a wealthy new yorker, the second a russian prince, and she also became the prolific author of over 25 books, as well as short stories and essays. Her experiences provide insight into a changing world for women, especially southern female authors. Her first interactions with editors proved particularly enlightening about how the gendered code of conduct of the day was changing. These interchanges highlighted the difficulties women encountered in literary magazines, even as such journals increasingly sought white southerners stories as part of sectional reconciliation. For many decades, southern white women had been authoring books generally novels focused on courtship and marriage, aimed at a female audience. As the civil war receded, some women attempted to scale more exalted heights of northern publishing. Rives attempts there yield insights into barriers and opportunities. In the 1870s, white southern writers increase their visibility by participating in the local color movement, which featured regional dialects. Among southerners, Joel Chandler harriss uncle remus stories led the way, and mary murphy began publishing her appalachian stories in the 1870s. Thomas nelson page popularize the plantation romance set in the antebellum civil war period. Americans seemed to have found simpler lives in Close Relationships on the plantation. Magazines, because of their growing readership, presented a new, lucrative pathway into a literary career. The atlantic commanded great respect. Harpers monthly was the bestselling magazine of the day. Both faced competition from the illustrated magazine, as well as others like appletons and lippincott. Emily reeves amelie rives claimed she had an almost accidental entrance into publishing. Three years after her first story appeared, she said, i wrote that into evenings, sitting up in bed. I wrote it because i like to write and because i had the story in my mind. One day a nice boy of who we were very fond was visiting at the house and found that story in the library. Nothing would do but he must take it back to boston when he went. He then submitted it to the Atlantic Monthly. These basic facts, while correct, indicated nothing of the deliberate campaign that amelie rives had waged to break into print. In fact, before she was discovered, rives had tried to publish a novel. In 1884, as a 21yearold, she submitted a manuscript entitled civilization to the formidable boston publisher hoffman mifflin. This was a bold move for an unpublished author, and especially a young southern lady. Perhaps predictably from an unsolicited manuscript, it was rejected. Reeves wrote the publishers, i thank you very much for having read my story, civilization, and am very sorry to have given you so much trouble for nothing. Of course i am disappointed, but still convinced that you know much better than i could the worth of the story. Defending her decision to submit her manuscript, amelie told the publishing house, i never wrote a novel before, and she added that she wanted to aid her close friend moody pleasant, who suffered from a disfiguring cleft palate, relying on the code of ladylike conduct as justification. She ended her letter, i tell you this in order that you may not think me very presumptuous if i try again. Nevertheless, rives found it very difficult to remain sweetly stoic with rejection. When the publishers representative mentioned grammatical errors in her rives, in her novel, rives disclaimed authorship. She said i must tell you that the young lisman who really wrote civilization the young englishman who really wrote civilization has permitted me to tell you i did not really write it. I do scribble may someday send you something of mine, but i write only very stupid things on the order of essays. This first unsuccessful attempt at publishing apparently led rives to seek alternative pathways. The dreary historians have suggested that the most successful 19thcentury novelist relied on sponsorship, a truth that ameli in amelie intuitively grasped. She needed a sponsor. Difficult for a southern woman, but she had two friends interested in her work who possessed a necessary connection. Both were young unmarried men and she resorted to flotation and flattery to peak pique their interest. One possible sponsor was already in rives life. For almost nine months, she had been exchanging letters with virginia author Thomas Nelson page, a distant cousin 10 years older than she. These letters were not an attempt to win paiges heart, what part of a careful campaign that aimed for literary companionship and sponsorship. The letters indicate a young woman trying to fascinate by alternating between sensuality and intellectuality, neither of which were supposed to be part of the southern belles repertoire. Possibly also viewing page as a literary soulmate, rives hoped for praise, and notice, and that he would bring her writing to national publishers. When Thomas Nelson page and amelie rives began to correspond, he was practicing law here in richmond. More conservative than she, he also took a more traditional view of a womans place. They shared common piedmont, virginia ancestors and literary leanings. Both were fascinated by the ancient world, loved scottish dialect and English Heritage stories. Clearly important to rives were links to the literary world. In the spring of 1884, the story that vaulted page to National Fame had been accepted by century magazine. Rives, in her first reply to page, blended mystery, exoticism, and drama. With seeming frankness, she declared that his letter had been fascinating. When he suggested she was a flirt, she pictured herself as a dangerous siren. As for flirting, dear cos, you say it is in my nature, and what will you say when i tell you frankly yes . It is there very strongly and im afraid very indelibly. What will you say again when i tell you i do not flirt . It is true, quite true, and she boasted she had recently foregone a conquest. As a belle who signaled her general availability, amelie assured page he held a special place in her regard. Do you understand i speak to you as i would too few people, man or woman . And you must not laugh at me, she chided. You do not know how anxious i am to see your story about marsh chan. I find i am thinking of you through the long night. Remember, you told me of it last summer. She claimed to hate modern fiction by henry james, and talked paiges work. I would rather read something you had written from your heart then even that undeniably beautiful book the portrait of a lady. With sensuous imagery, she predicted pages literary fame. I am sure you will be one of the famous writers, as i am of the moan of wind down my chimney. That is the most indisputable fact, as you yourself would say. Can you see the lilette flames from the fresh oakwood flitting around like little salamanders . She later consoled page for an unfavorable review by comparing him to shakespeare. The remainder of rives letter took a common approach. In entertaining page, she showed her skill at various literary genres and alluded to her wide reading. As the letters end, she returns to the theme of attraction. I wish with all my heart to see you, to know you better, and to love you more, but how is one to behave when i in fact feel you are all the time thinking i am trying to flirt with you and to fascinate not your true friendship, not your honest love, but that berserk which lurks in every newfoundland dog and which i am sure is part and parcel of every man alive. Here she combines a knowledge of novelist charles kingsleys book about the warrior ethic among anglosaxons with a comparison of plus to love a difference that page, who preferred women firmly on the pedestal, probably did not wish to consider. When page asked rives in mid march 1984 to tell about herself, she declared an utter lack of selfknowledge. I fear less of myself than i know of greek, and of that i know only there is a beginning and an end, which to our alpha and omega. The end with me is not yet. Using end as a segue, she launched into a disquisition on marriage. They say marriage is the end with women. I hope not. I do not want to be married myself, and yet and yet how lonely are the old maids. She then proffered a cameo of her spinster aunt. My aunt ella reeves is a living warning to me. She is 48. She is very yellow. She wears pale brown stockings that wrinkle, and cloth slippers that are out at the toes. She is very good and unbearably disagreeable. She eats ducks and plays on a melodian for recreation. Rives pointedly ended the portrait, i do not want a husband, but i think a melodia is equally undesirable. Rives intentionally raised contradictions. Her doctors had warned that writing was affecting her health. Everyone comes to see me. My room is a little court in a big, gilded wicker chair runabout with blueribbons. While being delicate was quite ladylike, rives also proclaimed her vibrancy and emphasized her body in a distinctly unladylike way, celebrating her driving herself in a first carriage ride since her illness. She wrote the air was like wine and had a really vileness v inous effect on me. I shouted like a big boy conscious of his big boydom. The wind blew all my curls straight up on and, and so on end, and so happy was i that i forgot to be vain and pull them back into order. Order. Rives took a reference as an opportunity to joke about her own love of bathing. I am a very diogenes and live in my tub. As if the image of her nude body in a bathtub was not transgressive enough, she closed the paragraph with a width of religious heterodoxy. The cleanliness being next to godliness, and im being near heaven through that, means that any other do persevere through daytoday. Rives, as she advertised her fascination, so this relationship as a chance for intellectual exchange as literary sponsorship. Even as her first letters to page showed off her wide reading and ability to write in different dialects and genres, she very slowly pulled him into her world of writing. Only in her third letter did she mention her poetry. I send you some jewels i made a year ago. I am a lazy wench and these being already copied, i send them to you. By the summer of 1884, amelie began her literary aspirations. In july, she confided i too have written a novel this summer, but i fear not what one would look for in a girl. Being made of so muscular an order that even men would have to chew to digested. She then assured page, do not be thinking that it smacks of immorality. Not so, i swear. She revealed a little more. By the spring of 1885, page had begun to court a wealthy woman and his friendship with amelie became merely literary. That fall, after the century magazine accepted his story, page showed some of amelies works to his editor. She also secured another male friend, william sigourney otis, to help toward publication. Will otis was that nice boston boy who showed her story to the editor of Atlantic Monthly. In 1885, he was a 28yearold lawyer from a prominent family who had graduated from Harvard College and harvard law school. Contemporaries considered will a strikingly handsome man, noted for his geniality, wit, and readiness with repartee, athletic and active he was a Founding Editor of the harvard lampoon. Will otis and amelie rives may even have been engaged. That was the impression she gave in october 1880ive when she told 1885 when she told rives it is all off between will and myself and i feel as we as air. Otis scored the first success for rives, who told about it in late october 1885. Will took a short story to houghton mifflin, and readers for the Atlantic Monthly got hold of it. I cant pretend to tell you all the nice things he said. He thinks he is a man and insisted on my coming at once boston. When will told him that would be impossible, he laughed and asked if i were in prison. Rives was ecstatic, marveling just to think the first short story i ever wrote coming out in the atlantic. Thomas Bailey Eldridge was not just a reader. He was editor at the magazine, renowned for its fiction. Although his first reaction to rives story was wildly enthusiastic and he said he wants every scrap i ever wrote. She gratefully gushed to aldri ch, i will do whatever you think best with regard to it and anything else i ever write. Rives had just achieved publication with a story set in 16th century england. Here she different from most southern writers, who wrote about the south. Rives wrote the story in an era entranced by stories of chivalric heroes. Hers was more pointed toward the national rather than a southern audience. While the stories featured romance, the resourcefulness and daring of its heroines foreshadowed rives later writing. Over the next few months, rives pelted aldrich with manuscripts as she sought to make the editor her literary guide. She pledged her loyalty. You shall have the very first links of my brain and heart, and i will write for no one else in the world if you want me to write for you. The next few stories that rives sent alrich did not please him. At least two were eventually published and show she was writing historical fiction in different locales. Getting to worry in december that aldrich merely wanted her to replicate a brother to dragons, amelie complained i am going to begin on a sister to dragons, followed by a brotherinlaw to dragons, and these will be the progenitor of a race of little nephews, nieces, and grandchildren to dragons, which shall all be sent in time. Please forgive me if i have been at all impertinent. I would not be that for the world. Despite her exasperation, rives pleaded for aldrichs approval at the same time she begged for editorial advice. She begged him to visit and suddenly indicated her elite jimmy back by describing her home as one of the very few old southern homesteads which has remained in the same family for 200 years. She excused her unconventional requests on the grounds of gratitude. I think i want to wait on you a little and fetch things for you, and to know you and to learn the things you like, and to earn your approval and the right ear friendship. To your friendship. It isnt too much, is it . In truth, it seems to have been far too much for the new england editor, who labeled her letters singular correspondent. Irritated by this author, who was not the young man he expected, aldrich found her responses to questions of whether the article should be signed with initials or a nom de plume to be the last straw. Even if amelie exulted over her storys acceptance, she received other good news. Richard watson gilder, editor at the century, which to publish a story that page had shown him. Suddenly amelie was dealing with proxies with prestigious publishers. For a young woman of 22, this was a heady new experience. In ladylike fashion, rives had to use gobetweens to gain acceptance of her writing. Yet how far she should go in publicizing her authorship was a problem. Although most southern female authors in 1885 published under pen names, amelie first told aldrich you may also use my name, just as you please. I am perfectly willing to submit everything to your judgment. Yet rives responded to pages news about her acceptance by begging him not to reveal her name to the centurys editor. I am beginning to get frightfully shy and alarmed and feel like taking my head in the sand of 20 noms de plume lichen ostrich. I would rather not. The question of whether rives would publish under her own name occurred repeatedly and showed how her ambitions conflicted with proper behavior of southern women. In november, she suggested a pen name. By early december, she asked aldrich just to print the story without any name, and later that month consider using her initials. The entire matter took a bizarre twist in late january 1886. Both aldrich and the other editor received letters supposedly from rives that she would publish under her own name. Publish my name, and i do not want you to think it is strange that i have asked you not to publish my name after my short stories and whatever of mine you have. The letters to page said my father has asked me to publish my name in the injury the century. Aldrich believed this letter wasnt was evidence rives had corresponded with another editor. She called the letter a hope. She said, there are only two people with handwriting identical to mine. One is my sister and one is perhaps the only enemy i have. Amelie self righteously asserted i have had no correspondence with mr. Gilder. The verses were sent him by mr. Page, my cousin. At the same time, rives sent a distraught note to paige to stop the publication of her name in the century. She said, i do not wish my name published. I have said so over and over again. I wouldnt have aldrich to think me so childish and doubledealing for anything in the world. Later that month, rives declared that the letter page had received was a perfect forgery. Was someone forging letters or did rives s