Talk:A New England Nun and Other Stories

Reviews
The Nation, "Recent Novels," 11 June 1891: Miss Wilkins's new volume is in the vein of her earlier one, and goes far to prove it inexhaustible. The poor, dingy old New England women have lost none of their bleakness, the young ones nothing of their pathetic attempt at youth under difficulties. The kitchen operations go on as before, and over all this dismal life float rosy clouds of faith, loyalty, and heroism, without which one would feel that nothing was left but suicide. The delicacy of Miss Wilkins's hand never fails, any more than does her fertility of resource in incident. With all the monotony of entourage, a tender surprise is in every story. It is not strange that this patient monotony, these stories of self-immolation, warm the cockles of the hearts of New Englanders the world over, and prompt the feeling that martyrdom has first found its fitting garments in faded gingham.

The Atlantic Monthly, "New England in the Short Story," June 1891: There is a slight bond between Mrs. Slosson's work and that of Miss Wilkins in the disposition of Miss Wilkins to single out for her subjects highly accented phases of New England life, but the manner of the two writers is quite distinct. They are alike in this, that they leave the reader to his own conclusions, and rarely impose their reflections upon his attention. In her latest collection, Miss Wilkins has included twenty-four stories. The book is charged with tender sentiment, yet once only, so far as we remember, at the close of the moving story of Christmas Jenny, does the author introduce anything which may be likened to an artistic use of sentiment. In this story the figures of the girl and her lover make the kind of foil which we are used to in German sentimental literature. The touch here, however, is so slight as almost to escape notice. It serves chiefly to remind one how entirely Miss Wilkins depends for her effects upon the simple pathos or humor which resides in the persons and situations that are made known through a few strong, direct disclosures. The style is here the writer. The short, economical sentences, with no waste and no niggardliness, make up stories which are singularly pointed, because the writer spends her entire strength upon the production of a single impression. The compression of these stories is remarkable, and almost unique in our literature, and it is gained without any sacrifice of essentials and by no mere narrowness of aim, but by holding steadily before the mind the central, vital idea, to the exclusion of all by-thoughts, however interesting they may be. Hence it happens frequently that the reader, though left satisfied on the main issue, is piqued by the refusal of the storyteller to meet his natural curiosity on other points. Thus in A Discovered Pearl the affairs of Lucy and Marlow are settled, but one is left to his surmises as to what the actual history of Marlow has been; and in A Pot of Gold, though Joseph Tenney is rehabilitated, the reader is as consumed with curiosity as Jane to know just what the box contained; then he is ashamed of himself, and confesses that the story-teller is above the weakness of satisfying merely idle curiosity.

Mrs. Slosson depends upon the interlocutors for the most telling effects in her stories; Miss Wilkins, with her passion for brevity, her power of packing a whole story in a phrase, a word, although she gives her characters full rein sometimes, naturally relies chiefly upon her own condensed report of persons, incidents, and things. Sententious talk, though not unknown in New England, runs the risk of being unnaturally expressive, and Miss Wilkins shows her fine artistic sense by not trusting to it for the expression of her characters. As a rule, the speech of the New England men and women in her stories is very simple and natural; her art lies in the selection she makes of what they shall say, the choice of a passage which helps on the story. Thus the brevity of speech which is in itself a characteristic of New England people is not made to carry subtleties or to have a very full intrinsic value, nor is it a mere colloquialism, designed to give color and naturalness, but it is the fit expression which conveys a great deal to the reader, because, like the entire story, it is a condensation, an epitome.

Of the genuine originality of these stories it is hard to speak too strongly. There is, indeed, a common character to the whole series, an undertone of hardship, of loss, of repressed life, of sacrifice, of the idolatry of duty, but we suspect this is due more to the prevailing spirit of New England life than to any determining force of Miss Wilkins's genius. For the most part, she brings to light some pathetic passage in a strongly marked individuality, and the variety of her characterizations is noticeable. Now and then she touches a very deep nature, and opens to view a secret of the human heart which makes us cry out that here is a poet, a seer. Such an effect is produced by the most powerful story in the book, Life Everlastin'. More frequently she makes us exclaim with admiration over the novelty, yet truthfulness, of her portraitures, as in The Revolt of "Mother" and the story which gives the title to her book. Always there is a freedom from commonplace, and a power to hold the interest to the close which is owing, not to a trivial ingenuity, but to the spell which her personages cast over the reader's mind as soon as they come within his ken. He wonders what they will do; and if he is surprised at any conclusion, the surprise is due, not to any trick in the author, but to the unexpected issue of an original conception, which reflection always shows to be logical and reasonable.

The humor which is a marked feature of Miss Wilkins's stories is of a pungent sort. Every story has it, and it is a savor which prevents some, that otherwise would be rather painful, from oppressing the reader unduly.