Writing Out My Heart
Selections from the Journal of Frances E. Willard, 1855-96
Exploring the interior life of the tireless reformer
Cloth – $70
978-0-252-02139-8
Publication Date
Cloth: 08/01/1995
About the Book
A trailblazing reform leader and feminist, Frances E. Willard is best known for her leadership of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU), in her time the nation's largest women's organization. Her journal, long hidden away in a cupboard at the National WCTU headquarters, was rediscovered in 1982, and immediately brought about a reconsideration of her private and public life.Writing Out My Heart excerpts substantial portions of Willard's forty-nine volume journal. Written during her teens, twenties, and fifties, the journal documents the creation of Willard's self while also standing as an explicit and painful record of one woman's coming to terms with her love for women. Other sections reveal what motivated Willard to take part in reform movements; the heretofore unexplored nature of religion in her life; and the arc of her growing commitment to the "cause of woman."
Supplemented by an in-depth introduction and generous annotations, Writing Out My Heart sheds new light on an extraordinary figure and explores themes and institutions central to women's lives in nineteenth-century America.
About the Author
Frances E. Willard (1839-1898) was a reformer, feminist, and longtime leader of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union. Carolyn De Swarte Gifford is coeditor of Let Something Good Be Said: Speeches and Writings of Frances E. Willard.Related Titles
