An Imperative Duty (Paperback)

W.D. Howells

ISBN 10: 1551119145 / ISBN 13: 9781551119144

Published by Broadview Press Ltd, Peterborough, 2010

About this Item

Paperback. An Imperative Duty tells the story of Rhoda Aldgate, a young woman on the verge of marriage who has been raised by her aunt to assume that she is white, but who is in fact the descendant of an African-American grandmother. The novel traces the struggles of Rhoda, her family, and her suitor to come to terms with the implications of Rhodas heritage. Howells employs this stock situation to explore the newly urgent questions of identity, morality, and social policy raised by miscegenation in the post-Reconstruction United States. The novel imagines interracial marriage sympathetically at a time when racist sentiment was on the rise, and does this in one of Howellss most aesthetically economical performances in the short novel form.Appendices to this Broadview Edition include material on the tragic mulatta in literature, interracial marriage, the science of race in the nineteenth century, and Howellss literary realism. An engaging short novel by an important American realist, An Imperative Duty addresses the topic ofinterracial marriage. Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability.

Seller Inventory # 9781551119144

Bibliographic Details

• Title: An Imperative Duty (Paperback)
• Publisher: Broadview Press Ltd, Peterborough
• Publication Date: 2010
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1551119145
• ISBN 13: 9781551119144
• Binding: Paperback
• Condition: new

About this title

Synopsis

An Imperative Duty tells the story of Rhoda Aldgate, a young woman on the verge of marriage who has been raised by her aunt to assume that she is white, but who is in fact the descendant of an African-American grandmother. The novel traces the struggles of Rhoda, her family, and her suitor to come to terms with the implications of Rhoda’s heritage. Howells employs this stock situation to explore the newly urgent questions of identity, morality, and social policy raised by “miscegenation” in the post-Reconstruction United States. The novel imagines interracial marriage sympathetically at a time when racist sentiment was on the rise, and does this in one of Howells’s most aesthetically economical performances in the short novel form.

Appendices to this Broadview Edition include material on the “tragic mulatta” in literature, interracial marriage, the “science” of race in the nineteenth century, and Howells’s literary realism.

About the Author

Paul R. Petrie is Professor of English at Southern Connecticut State University.