Mary Eleanor Wilkins Freeman

"Mary Freeman" redirects here. For the American swimmer, see Mary Freeman (swimmer). For the politician in Iowa, see Mary Lou Freeman.
Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

Mary Eleanor Wilkins Freeman
Born (1852-10-31)October 31, 1852
Randolph, Massachusetts
Died March 13, 1930(1930-03-13) (aged 77)
Metuchen, New Jersey
Resting place Hillside Cemetery, Scotch Plains, New Jersey
Occupation Novelist
Nationality United States
Notable works A New England Nun
Spouse Dr. Charles Manning Freeman (m.1902)
Signature

Mary Eleanor Wilkins Freeman (October 31, 1852 – March 13, 1930) was a prominent 19th-century American author.

Biography

She was born in Randolph, Massachusetts on October 31, 1852, to Eleanor Lothrop and Warren Edward Wilkins, who originally baptized her as "Mary Ella".[1] Freeman's parents were orthodox Congregationalists, causing her to have a very strict childhood.[2] Religious constraints play a key role in some of her works.

In 1867, the family moved to Brattleboro, Vermont, where Freeman graduated from the local high school before attending attended Mount Holyoke College (then, Mount Holyoke Female Seminary) in South Hadley, Massachusetts, for one year, from 1870–71. She later finished her education at Glenwood Seminary in West Brattleboro.[3] When the family's dry goods business in Vermont failed in 1873, the family returned to Randolph, Massachusetts. Freeman's mother died three years later, and she changed her middle name to "Eleanor" in her memory.[3]

Freeman's father died suddenly in 1883, leaving her without any immediate family and an estate worth only $973. She moved in with a friend and began writing as her only source of income.[4]

During a visit to Metuchen, New Jersey in 1892, she met Dr. Charles Manning Freeman, a non-practicing medical doctor seven years younger than she. After years of courtship and delays, the two were married on January 1, 1902. Immediately after, she firmly established her name as "Mary E. Wilkins Freeman", which she asked Harper's to use on all of her work.[4] The couple built a home in Metuchen, where Freeman was known as a local celebrity for her writing, despite having occasionally published satirical fictional representations of her neighbors.[4]

Her husband, who suffered from alcoholism and an addiction to sleeping powders, was committed to the New Jersey State Hospital for the Insane in Trenton, and the two legally separated a year later.[4] After his death in 1923, he left the majority of his wealth to his chauffeur and only one dollar to his former wife.[4]

In April 1926, Freeman became the first recipient of the William Dean Howells Medal for Distinction in Fiction from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

She suffered a heart attack and died in Metuchen on March 15, 1930, at age 77. She was interred in Hillside Cemetery in Scotch Plains, New Jersey.[4]

Writing

Freeman began writing stories and verse for children while still a teenager to help support her family and was quickly successful. When the supernatural caught her interest, the result was a group of short stories which combined domestic realism with supernaturalism and these have proved very influential. Her best known work was written in the 1880s and 1890s while she lived in Randolph. She produced more than two dozen volumes of published short stories and novels. She is best known for two collections of stories, A Humble Romance and Other Stories (1887) and A New England Nun and Other Stories (1891). Her stories deal mostly with New England life and are among the best of their kind. Freeman is also remembered for her novel Pembroke (1894), and she contributed a notable chapter to the collaborative novel The Whole Family (1908).

Bibliography

References

Notes

  1. ↑ Fishinger, Sondra. "Mary E. Wilkins Freeman, 1852–1930", in Past and Promise: Lives of New Jersey Women. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1997: 139. ISBN 0-8156-0418-1
  2. ↑ Freeman, Mary E. Wilkins. "The Norton Anthology of American Literature". seventh ed. Vol. C. Ed. Nina Baym. New York: Norton & Company, 2007. Pg. 625-26.
  3. 1 2 Fishinger, Sondra. "Mary E. Wilkins Freeman, 1852–1930", in Past and Promise: Lives of New Jersey Women. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1997: 140. ISBN 0-8156-0418-1
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Fishinger, Sondra. "Mary E. Wilkins Freeman, 1852–1930", in Past and Promise: Lives of New Jersey Women. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1997: 141. ISBN 0-8156-0418-1

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