From Publishers Weekly
Although she was the prolific author of poetry, short stories, criticism and 20 novels (including the 1942 Pulitzer Prize winner, In This Our Life), Virginia-born Glasgow (1872-1945) feared rightly that in time she would be considered merely a regional writer or a minor novelist of manners. In this solidly documented, sympathetic portrayal of a famously secretive woman, Goodman (Edith Wharton's Inner Circle) seeks to revive Glasgow's reputation as a writer and important influence on fellow Southerners Robert Penn Warren, Eudora Welty and William Faulkner. Having set herself the task of writing a social history of her state, Glasgow began with the publication of her first novel at the age of 24. She broke with the Southern tradition of romanticizing the past, and instead wrote realistic descriptions of the rise of the middle class and industrialization of the early 20th century. But while she was considered progressive in her time, Glasgow seems dated now, both in her treatment of women and blacks and in her use of written dialect ("Dat's de tribble wid dis yer worl'; w'en hit changes yo' fortune hit don' look ter changin' yo' skin as well"). Although insecure and isolated by her growing deafness, Glasgow tirelessly pursued literary fame, cultivating friendships with influential critics and publishers. Why then "did her literary coin rise with each novel and then fall almost as far as a Confederate dollar?" asks Goodman, paraphrasing Glasgow's friend James Branch Cabell,"because each of her books showed the influence of current trends...[and] subsequent shifts in literary fashions tended to hide their 'real merits as works of art.'" 29 illustrations.-- subsequent shifts in literary fashions tended to hide their 'real merits as works of art.'" 29 illustrations. Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Library Journal
Ellen Glasgow (1873-1958), arguably one of the most important Southern writers of her day and the winner of the 1942 Pulitzer Prize for In This Our Life, is nonetheless not well known. Born to a large and wealthy Richmond family, Glasgow felt that she and her family were cursed?she herself lost her hearing at a young age?and this deep pessimism is reflected in her fiction. Goodman (Edith Wharton's Inner Circle, LJ 5/15/94) has written a competent, well-researched, but somewhat sterile biography of a woman who is hard to pigeon-hole. For example, Glasgow considered herself a progressive on the issue of race, yet, as Goodman points out, her treatment of African Americans in her fiction is a mixture of antebellum naivete and romanticism. Like her contemporaries Willa Cather and Edith Wharton, to whom she was often compared, Glasgow had a true gift for capturing the social aura of a certain fleeting period in American history. With an impressive bibliography of primary sources; recommended for large public and academic libraries.?Diane Gardner Premo, P.L., Rochester, NYCopyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Booklist
In her day, Ellen Glasgow was mentioned in the same breath with Edith Wharton and Willa Cather, but in succeeding years, this southern fiction writer, author of rich novels such as Barren Ground (1925) and Vein of Iron (1935), has slipped into critical disregard and popular neglect. It is unfortunate that this is the case, and it is hoped that Goodman's thoughtful biography will send contemporary readers to Glasgow's still-vital work. Glasgow is not an easy character to pin down--contradiction and ambivalence were the materiel of her nature--but Goodman sensitive portrait is done with a humanist's understanding of the "artistic temperament." Glasgow's mother sprang from Virginia aristocracy, her father, whom she despised, ran the Tredegar Iron Works in Richmond. Her early life was not sparkling. But to the mature Ellen, art and life were one and the same; she lived to write, and coming to publication early, made a distinguished career of it. In analyzing Glasgow's fiction, Goodman shows professional acumen as well as her own writerly talents. Brad Hooper


Review
"Susan Goodman's thorough knowledge of Glasgow's twenty-odd novels allows her to relate Glasgow's characters and experiences to persons and events in the author's life... Goodman, her subject well researched, navigates us through Glasgow's seemingly unbearable trials with aplomb."--Anne J. Tate, Georgia Review


Book Description
In Ellen Glasgow: A Biography, Susan Goodman vividly brings the famously secretive writer to life, penetrating the myths, half-truths, and lies that have swirled around Glasgow since the publication of her first novel, The Descendent, in 1896. Drawing on previously unpublished papers and personal interviews, Goodman uncovers the engrossing details of Glasgow's family history, social milieu, personal tragedies, and literary career. Glasgow emerges from these pages as a woman of great courage, self-discipline, and indomitable will who survived tragedy after tragedy. Throughout her life, literature remained her driving passion. In the novels which were her life's work, Glasgow sought a commitment to truth beyond human weakness, to what she called the "living pulse" of experience. Goodman explores the genesis of each novel, detailing Glasgow's process of writing and offering incisive critical appraisals of her early successes and failures as well as the triumphs of her later years. In Ellen Glasgow: A Biography, Susan Goodman has emulated her subject perfectly, uncovering Glasgow's rich and complicated inner life and reasserting Glasgow's important position in America's literary history.


About the Author
Susan Goodman is a professor of English at the University of Delaware and author of American Novelists and Manners, 1880--1940, forthcoming from Johns Hopkins.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

In Ellen Glasgow: A Biography, Susan Goodman vividly brings the famously secretive writer to life, penetrating the myths, half-truths, and lies that have swirled around Glasgow since the publication of her first novel, The Descendent, in 1896. Drawing on previously unpublished papers and personal interviews, Goodman uncovers the engrossing details of Glasgow's family history, social milieu, personal tragedies, and literary career. Glasgow emerges from these pages as a woman of great courage, self-discipline, and indomitable will who survived tragedy after tragedy. Throughout her life, literature remained her driving passion. In the novels which were her life's work, Glasgow sought a commitment to truth beyond human weakness, to what she called the "living pulse" of experience. Goodman explores the genesis of each novel, detailing Glasgow's process of writing and offering incisive critical appraisals of her early successes and failures as well as the triumphs of her later years. In Ellen Glasgow: A Biography, Susan Goodman has emulated her subject perfectly, uncovering Glasgow's rich and complicated inner life and reasserting Glasgow's important position in America's literary history.

SYNOPSIS

In Ellen Glasgow: A Biography, Susan Goodman vividly brings the famously secretivewriter to life, penetrating the myths, half-truths, and lies that have swirled around Glasgow since the publication of her first novel, The Descendent, in 1896. Drawing on previously unpublished papers and personal interviews, Goodman uncovers the engrossing details of Glasgow's family history, social milieu, personal tragedies, and literary career. Glasgow emerges from these pages as a woman of great courage, self-discipline, and indomitable will who survived tragedy after tragedy. Throughout her life, literature remained her driving passion. In the novels which were her life's work, Glasgow sought a commitment to truth beyond human weakness, to what she called the "living pulse" of experience. Goodman explores the genesis of each novel, detailing Glasgow's process of writing and offering incisive critical appraisals of her early successes and failures as well as the triumphs of her later years. In Ellen Glasgow: A Biography, Susan Goodman has emulated her subject perfectly, uncovering Glasgow's rich and complicated inner life and reasserting Glasgow's important position in America's literary history.