Loves of Harriet Beecher Stowe

"I love everybody," Harriet Beecher Stowe once told an acquaintance. Of course, this wasn't entirely true, for there were certainly those she didn't like at all. But love was surely a motivating force in her life. "She was impelled by love," wrote her son Charles, "and did what she did, and wrote what she did, under the impulse of love." And thus we have Loves of Harriet Beecher Stowe, the title of Phillip McFarland's excellent new biography. McFarland's book focuses on those Mrs. Stowe loved most: her husband, Calvin Stowe; her father, Lyman Beecher; and her famous brother, Henry Ward Beecher. There were many others she loved, of course, including her children, her other siblings, and her many friends. But by focusing on these three men, McFarland enables us, in a highly original way, to understand Mrs. Stowe and what drove her. She wrote the most important, influential book of the 19th century -- Uncle Tom's Cabin. She also penned several other novels and countless articles in magazines and newspapers. That she managed to write much of this while keeping house and raising little ones is nothing short of remarkable. But then, as one learns from reading this book, Harriet Beecher Stowe was a remarkable woman. Phillip McFarland is one of the premier biographers in the U.S. today. His previous biographies on Nathaniel Hawthorne and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow were critically acclaimed, though they did not make any best-seller lists. Loves of Harriet Beecher Stowe adds to his reputation. McFarland writes beautiful prose, and he has an exceptional ability to get inside his subject. Read this book, and you will come to know Harriet Beecher Stowe intimately.

Every American should read this book. It came to me as a gift, and, to be frank, I took it up reluctantly. I mean, who wants to read about a sanctimonious busybody, once influential, now largely forgotten but for her famous book fluttered before your face in junior high? Within pages, that question became its opposite: who doesn't? Having picked the book up, I couldn't put it down. The story is utterly absorbing, filled with passion, filled with pathos - religious fervor, Civil War, its prelude, its aftermath, the Gilded Age. It is the story of public triumph - that famous book again, plus many others - and private grief - the drowning of a beloved son, the disappearance of another in San Francisco, pursued by demons, the trials of a famous brother. The writing is brilliant, even breathtaking, like some wild Disney ride, but that is not what distinguishes the book. What does is the organization of voices, events, incidents, themes. All are woven into a seamless tapestry made up of many, many intensely colored threads. The rush of narative delights, but ultimately it is the intricate pattern that holds your attention. A perfect giift for anyone interested in 19 c. America. PS Ignore that foolish review in PW.