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A Summer of Hummingbirds: Love, Art, and Scandal in the Intersecting Worlds of
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A Summer of Hummingbirds: Love, Art, and Scandal in the Intersecting Worlds of Emily Dickinson, Mark Twain, Harriet Beecher Stowe, and Martin Jo Paperback - 2009

by Christopher Benfey

A renowned critic pens this surprising and scandalous story of how the interaction within the lives of some of the nation's most noted writers, poets, and artists shaped and changed American thought.


Summary

The country's most noted writers, poets, and artists converge at a singular moment in American life

At the close of the Civil War, the lives of Emily Dickinson, Mark Twain, Harriet Beecher Stowe, and Martin Johnson Heade intersected in an intricate map of friendship, family, and romance that marked a milestone in the development of American art and literature. Using the image of a flitting hummingbird as a metaphor for the gossamer strands that connect these larger-than-life personalities, Christopher Benfey re-creates the summer of 1882, the summer when Mabel Louise Todd-the protégé to the painter Heade-confesses her love for Emily Dickinson's brother, Austin, and the players suddenly find themselves caught in the crossfire between the Calvinist world of decorum, restraint, and judgment and a new, unconventional world in which nature prevails and freedom is all.

Details

  • Title A Summer of Hummingbirds: Love, Art, and Scandal in the Intersecting Worlds of Emily Dickinson, Mark Twain, Harriet Beecher Stowe, and Martin Jo
  • Author Christopher Benfey
  • Binding Paperback
  • Edition Reprint
  • Pages 304
  • Volumes 1
  • Language ENG
  • Publisher Penguin Publishing Group, NEW YORK
  • Date 2009-03-31
  • Features Bibliography, Index, Price on Product - Canadian, Table of Contents
  • ISBN 9780143115083 / 0143115081
  • Weight 0.56 lbs (0.25 kg)
  • Dimensions 8.44 x 5.5 x 0.68 in (21.44 x 13.97 x 1.73 cm)
  • Ages 18 to UP years
  • Grade levels 13 - UP
  • Themes
    • Chronological Period: 19th Century
    • Sex & Gender: Feminine
  • Dewey Decimal Code B

Media reviews

"A highly engaging and deftly written sequence of intertwined vignettes. . . . [A Summer of Hummingbirds] reads like a dream sequence, and should not be missed."
-Michael Kammen, The Boston Globe

Citations

  • Books & Culture, 09/01/2009, Page 17
  • New York Times Book Review, 04/26/2009, Page 24

About the author

Christopher Benfey is the Mellon Professor of English at Mount Holyoke College and the author of the award-winning book A Summer of Hummingbirds. He is a frequent contributor to the New York Times Book Review, the New Republic, and the New York Review of Books. He lives in Amherst, Massachusetts.
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