Making the Bestseller List
Early American Popular Fiction
In the early years of the American Republic, books were scarce and expensive. The novel had yet to be recognized as a legitimate literary endeavor, and its critics regarded it as frivolous at best, dangerous and immoral at worst. Read predominately by women, this genre was feared corrosive and corruptive to the delicate female mind. However, as the decades passed, the novel cemented its place in the public's reading habits, laying hold of the imaginations of both male and female readers. By the first half of the nineteenth century, when innovations within the printing industry and the development of better distribution networks reduced the cost of books, America saw the rise a literary mass market.
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Mrs. Taylor remarks on Mrs. Rowson's Charlotte, one of the early works of popular fiction in America: "The first issue of the 1st American Edition!! - I nearly fainted when I saw this among a dozen worthless old novels he brought for me to see. Paid $150 00/100 - Honest - untouched, in good condition, for such a rare and popular book."
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America's first professional man of letters, Washington Irving contributed to a number of literary genres but is remembered primarily for his mastery of the short story. In his day, he competed in popularity with British authors such as Sir Walter Scott and Charles Dickens.
Unlike his British counterparts, though, Irving did not see his works pirated by U.S. publishers in the absence of international copyright laws.
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During his lifetime, James Fenimore Cooper was one of the world's most widely read novelists. A champion of the American pioneer spirit, Cooper turned to writing at the age of thirty to stave off bankruptcy, producing thirty-two novels in the course of his career. The technological innovations which lowered the cost of books after 1830 helped make him the first successful American popular novelist.
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From 1774 to 1820, only ninety fiction titles were published in America. However, the decade beginning in 1840 produced 800 works of fiction, answering the ravenous demand for novels. Women, in particular, were drawn to romantic stories of exotic people and places, and by 1872, the professional female author had arrived on the literary scene. To the dismay of male authors like Nathaniel Hawthorne, these "scribbling women" sold the great majority of novels.
A domestic novel about real women's joy, pain and triumph, The Lamplighter proved a publishing phenomenon. Within the first twenty days, 20,000 copies sold, many to female readers. This segment of society further accounted for the sale of another 70,000 books in the first year, setting off a book-buying trend that would continue throughout the second half of the nineteenth century.
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A prolific writer, Mrs. Southworth wrote sixty novels and countless short stories for popular audiences. Published at first in newspapers and magazines, such as the New York Weekly, her stories drew on the aesthetics and sensibilities of her society. Southworth's work has been summed up as follows, "Conventional pieties, personal passions, and radical departures from gentility intermingle in Southworth's work, reflecting not only her intimate involvement with the values of her society, but also the complexity and self-contradictions inherent in that culture." Dictionary of Literary Biography.
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