EOS

EDITIONS

• Scherman, Timothy H., ed. Elizabeth Oakes Smith: Selected Writings, Volume III—from Novels and Drama. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, forthcoming, 2025).

• Scherman, Timothy H., ed.Elizabeth Oakes Smith: Selected Writings, Volume II—Feminist Editorial and Public Activism. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 2024).

• Scherman, Timothy H., ed. Elizabeth Oakes Smith: Selected Writings, Volume I—Emergence and Fame. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 2023.

• Woidat, Caroline, ed.  The Western Captive and Other Indian Stories.  Toronto:  Broadview Press, 2015. 

PuBLISHED Biography and Criticism

• Sandra Tomc, “‘The Vast Pantheon of Speculation’ Edgar Allan Poe and His Women Biographers” in Poe and Women: Recognition and Revision, Eds. Amy Branam Armiento and Travis Montgomery (Lehigh University Press, 2023): 1-20.

• Tuchinsky, Adam-Max. “‘Dreams of Wild and Magnificent Scenery:’ Elizabeth Oakes Smith’s Katahdin.” Maine History 55/2 (2023). 39-54.

• Syrett, Nicholas L. "Age Disparity, Marriage, and the Gendering of Heterosexuality." Heterosexual Histories, edited by Rebecca L. Davis and Michele Mitchell (New York, USA: New York University Press, 2021). 96-119.

• Reed, Ashley. “I Have No Disbelief: Women’s Spiritualist Novels and Nonliberal Agencies.” Heaven’s Interpreters: Women Writers and Religious Agency in Nineteenth-Century America. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2020. 167-171 and passim.

• Zellinger, Elissa. “Elizabeth Oakes Smith’s Lyrical Activism” in Lyrical Strains: Liberalism and Women’s Poetry in Nineteenth-Century America. (Chapel Hill, NC: UNC Press, 2020). 62-97.

• Scherman, Timothy H., ed. “Elizabeth Oakes Smith.” Nineteenth Century Literature Criticism 387 (Farmington Hills, MI: Gale Publishing, 2020).

• Hsiao, Andrew, and Audrea Lim. “1852: Elizabeth Oakes Smith.” The Verso Book of Dissent: Revolutionary Words from Three Millennia of Rebellion and Resistance, (London: Verso Books, 2020).

• Larson, Kerry. “The Passion for Poetry in Lydia Sigourney and Elizabeth Oakes Smith.” A History of Nineteenth-Century American Women’s Poetry. Eds Jennifer Putzl and Alexandria Socarides. (New York, NY: Cambridge UP, 2017). 53-67.

• Syrett, Nicholas L. “The Great Life-Long Mistake: Women’s Rights Advocates and the Feminist Critique of Early Marriage.” American Child Bride: A History of Minors and Marriage in the United States, (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2016). 98–117

• Patterson, Cynthia Lee. “‘Hermaphroditish Disturbers of the Peace:’ Rufus Griswold, Elizabeth Oakes Smith, and Nineteenth-Century Discourses of Ambiguous Sex.” Women’s Studies (2016): 513-33.

• Irene S. Di Maio, "Friedrich Gerstäcker als Übersetzer: Aspekte eines Amerikabildes," Charles Sealsfield und die transatlantische Internationalität: Biographische Konditionierung und literarische Umsetzungen. Eds. Wynkrieg Kriegleder and Alexander Ritter with the assistance of Marc-Oliver Schuster. Vol. 11 of SealsfieldBibliothek: Wiener Studien und Texte. Ed. Alexander Ritter. Vienna, Präsens Verlag, 2016. 251-280. [This article is part of a longer study of the nineteenth-century German traveler writer Friedrich Gerstäcker's mediation of the image of America through his translation work. Elizabeth Oakes Smiths novel,The Western Captive: or, the Times of Tecumseh, and Thomas Farnham's travel account, Travels in the Great Western Prairies, The Anahuac Mountains and in the Oregon Territory serve as case studies.]

• Tuchinsky, Adam. "'Woman and Her Needs': Elizabeth Oakes Smith and the Divorce Question." Journal of Women's History 28/1 (Spring 2016): 38-59.

• Templin, Mary. Panic Fiction: Women and Antebellum Economic Crisis. Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press, 2014.

• Petrash, Antonia. “Elizabeth Oakes Smith, 1806-1893.” Long Island and the Woman Suffrage Movement. Arcadia Publishing: 2013. 119-124.

• Ginsberg, Leslie. "Minority/Majority: Childhood Studies and Antebellum American Literature." The Children's Table: Childhood Studies and the Humanities. Athens: U Georgia P, 2013. 105-23.

• Manning, Susan. "Did Human Character Change?: Representing Women and Fiction from Shakespeare to Virginia Woolf." Partial Answers: Journal of Literature and History of Ideas. 11/1(January 2013): 29-52.

• Beam, Dorri. “Fuller, Feminism, Pantheism.” Margaret Fuller and Her Circles. Eds. Brigitte Bailey, Katheryn P. Viens, Conrad Edick Wright. Durham, NC: U New Hampshire P, 2013. 52-76.

• Adler, Jeanne Winston. The Affair of the Veiled Murderess: An Antebellum Scandal and Mystery. (Buffalo: SUNY Press, 2011). [See Chapter 23, “Angel of Mercy,” which details Oakes Smith’s relation to Robinson’s murder case. This is the only published work I’ve seen that makes the case for Oakes Smith as the model for Hawthorne’s Zenobia in Blithesdale Romance.]

• Boyd, Anne E. “Elizabeth Oakes Smith.” Wielding the Pen: Writings on Authorship by American Women of the Nineteenth Century. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 2009.

• Patterson, Cynthia Lee.  “’Illustration of a Picture’: Nineteenth-Century Writers and the Philadelphia Pictorials” American Periodicals, 19/2 (2009): 136-64.

• Jaroff, Rebecca. “‘I Almost Danced Over My Freedom;’ Elizabeth Oakes Smith’s Liberation from the Literary Marketplace.” Popular Nineteenth-Century American Women Writers and the Literary Marketplace. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars, 2007. 172-188.

• Ray, Angela. “What Hath She Wrought? Woman’s Rights and the Nineteenth-Century Lyceum.” Rhetoric and Public Affairs 9/2 (2006): 183-214. This important essay—one of the only academic essays published on Oakes Smith’s lecture career— is also available at The Rosenberg Quarterly (2006).

• Wayne, Tiffany K. Woman Thinking: Feminism and Transcendentalism in Nineteenth-Century America. Lexington Books, 2005.

• Richards, Eliza. "Elizabeth Oakes Smith's Unspeakable Eloquence.” Gender and the Poetics of Reception in Poe's Circle. Cambridge UP, 2004.

• Bosco, Ronald A., Ed and Joel Myerson, Ed. “Elizabeth Oakes Smith, Recollections of Emerson, His Household and Friends (1924).” Emerson in His Own Time: A Biographical Chronicle of His Life, Drawn from Recollections, Interviews and Memoirs by Family, Friends, and Associates. Iowa City: U of Iowa P, 2003.

• Margrave, Veronica. "Elizabeth Oakes Smith (1806-1893) in Knight, Denise D. (ed. and preface) Writers of the American Renaissance: An A-to-Z Guide. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 2003.

• Rose, Jane E. "Expanding Woman's Sphere, Dismantling Class, and Building Community: The Feminism of Elizabeth Oakes Smith."CLA Journal. 45/2 (December 2001): 207-30.

• Woidat, Caroline. "Puritan Daughters and 'Wild' Indians: Elizabeth Oakes Smith's Narratives of Domestic Captivity." Legacy: A Journal of American Women Writers 18.1 (Spring 2001): 21-34.

• Belasco-Smith, Susan. "Elizabeth Oakes Smith" Dictionary of Literary Biography 235: American Literary Renaissance in New England, 4th Series. Detroit, MI: Gale Research, 2000.

• Kete, Mary Louise. "Gender Valences of Transcendentalism: The Pursuit of Idealism in Elizabeth Oakes-Smith's 'The Sinless Child.'"Separate Spheres No More. Ed, Monika Elbert. Tuscaloosa: U of Alabama Press, 2000.

• Cole, Phyllis. “The Nineteenth–Century Women's Rights Movement and the Canonization of Margaret Fuller.” ESQ: A Journal of the American Renaissance 44/(1-2):1-33.

• Kirkland, Leigh. “Elizabeth Oakes Smith (1806-1893).” Nineteenth-Century American Women Writers: A Bio-Bibliographical Critical Sourcebook. Westport, (CT: Greenwood, 1997. 324-330.

• Scherman, Timothy H. "Elizabeth Oakes Smith." Dictionary of Literary Biography 239: American Women Prose Writers, 1820-1870. Detroit, MI: Gale Research, 2000. 222-30.

• Diebold, William. "The Lady and the Salamander: A Forgotten Author and a Neglected Book about Rockland County." South of the Mountains: The Historical Society of Rockland County. 4.2. (April-June 1999): 3-18.

• Prins, Yopie. Victorian Sappho. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 1999. (chapter on American poets has a substantial section on EOS)

• Prins, Yopie and Virginia Jackson. "Lyrical Studies." Victorian Literature and Culture 27.2 (1999):521-30.

• Scherman, Timothy H. "Looking for Liz." The Researcher: Journal of the Carteret County Historical Society (Spring-Summer 1998): 4-17.

• Kirkland, Leigh. "Elizabeth Oakes Smith, 1806-1893," in Knight, Denise D. (ed. and preface); Nelson, Emmanuel S. (ed.) Nineteenth-Century American Women Writers: A Bio-Bibliographical Critical Sourcebook. Westport, CT: Greenwood; 1997. 324-30.

• Gray, Janet. “Elizabeth Oakes Smith.” She Weilds a Pen: American Women Poets of the Nineteenth-Century. London: Dent, 1997.

• Kirkland, Leigh. "A Human Life: Being the Autobiography of Elizabeth Oakes Smith" (a critical edition). Diss. Georgia State University, 1994.

• Nickels, Cameron and Timothy H. Scherman. "Elizabeth Oakes Smith: The Puritan as Feminist." de conscience: aspects du feminisme americain (1848-1875). Eds. Susan Goodman and Daniel Royot. Paris: Presses de la Sorbonne Nouvelle, 1994.

• Walker, Cheryl, ed. American Women Poets of the Nineteenth Century: An Anthology. New Brunswick: Rutgers UP, 1992.

• Lundquist, Kent, and Cameron Nickels. “Elizabeth Oakes Smith on Poe: A Chapter in the Recovery of His Nineteenth-Century Literary Reputation. "Poe and His Times: The Artist and His Milieu. Ed. Benjamin Franklin Fisher IV. Baltimore: Edgar Allan Poe Society, 1990. 235-46.

• Walker, Cheryl. The Nightingale's Burden: Women Poets and American Culture Before 1900. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1982.

• Wiltenburg, Joy. "Excerpts from the Diary of Elizabeth Oakes Smith." Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society (1984) 9/3: 534-48.

• Geissler, Kathleen M. "Literacy and Literary Ambition," in "Needles and Pens: The Social Meaning of Women's Literacy in Nineteenth-Century America," Diss. 1987.

• Sloane, David E. E. The Literary Humor of the Urban Northeast, 1830-1890. (Louisiana State University Press, 1983).

• Richards, Wynola L.. "A Review of the Life and Writings of Elizabeth Oakes Smith" Diss. Ball State University, 1981.

• Watts, Emily Stipes. “1800-1850: Sigourney, Smith and Osgood,” The Poetry of American Women from 1632 to 1945 (Austin, TX: U of Texas P) 1977. 83-120.

• Harding, Walter. “Elizabeth Oakes Smith on Thoreau.” Thoreau Society Bulletin: Devoted to the Life and Writings of Henry David Thoreau (1970) v110: 2-3.

• Woodward, Robert H. “Bryant and Elizabeth Oakes Smith: An Unpublished Bryant Letter.” Colby Quarterly 5 (1959): 69-74.

• Wyman, Mary A. Two American Pioneers, Seba Smith and Elizabeth Oakes Smith (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 1927).

• Maine Writers Research Club, et al. Just Maine Folks. [Lewiston: The Journal Printshop, 1924) 320-324.

• Upton, Harriet T., ed. Proceedings of the Twenty-sixth Annual Convention of the National American Woman Suffrage Association, held in Washington, D.C., February 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, and 20, 1894. (Washington, D.C.: The Association. 1894).

• “Women of Genius.” The Washington Post (1877-1922). (1884): 3.

• Current literature: A Magazine of Record and Review. (New York: Current Literature Pub. Co., August and September 1890) v5: 157, 174).

• Derby, James C. “Elizabeth Oakes Smith.” Fifty Years Among Authors, Books And Publishers. (New York: Carleton, 1884).

• Read, Thomas B. “Elizabeth Oakes Smith.” The Female Poets of America. 6th ed., (Philadelphia: E. H. Butler & Co., 1855) 23-34.

• “Elizabeth Oakes Smith: Phrenological Character.” The Phrenological Journal 17/2 (1853): 109-111.

• McCord, Louisa S. "Woman and Her Needs." DeBow's New Orleans Monthly Review (1852) 267-91.

• Hart, John S. “E. Oakes Smith.” The Female Prose Writers of America: With Portraits, Biographical Notices, And Specimens of Their Writings. (Philadelphia: E.H. Butler, 1851).

• Dumont, Henrietta. The language of flowers: The floral offering: a token of affection and esteem; comprising the language and poetry of flowers. (Philadelphia: H. C. Peck & T. Bliss. 1851).

• Caroline, May. The American Female Poets: With Biographical And Critical Notices. (Philadelphia: Lindsay & Blakiston. 1848).

• Embury, Emma C, et al. American wild flowers in their native haunts. (New York: D. Appleton & Company. 1845).

UnPUBLISHED PAPERS

• Scherman, Timothy. “Some Considerations on Eugenics and Disability in the Work of Elizabeth Oakes Smith,” American Literature Association Conference, Chicago, IL, May 24, 2024.

• Scherman, Timothy. “A Marriage Never Recognized: Oakes Smith v. Fuller, Oakes Smith and Fuller,” for the Elizabeth Oakes Smith Society panel, “Elizabeth Oakes Smith, Embattled,” American Literature Association Conference, Boston MA, May 27, 2023.

• White, Jonathan. “The Beginning of the End: Elizabeth Oakes Smith’s Private Civil War,” for the Elizabeth Oakes Smith Society panel, “Elizabeth Oakes Smith, Embattled,” American Literature Association Conference, Boston MA, May 27, 2023.

• Scherman, Timothy. “What’s in a Log? Engaging Students in the Archives to Document a Woman of ‘Poe's Circle,” for the Poe Studies Panel “Teaching Poe Experientially,” American Literature Association Conference, Chicago IL May 27, 2022. [Powerpoint for this presentation is HERE]

• Scherman, Timothy. “Ninety Years Since: Elizabeth Oakes Smith’s Resistance to Revolutionary Mythos in The Bald Eagle.” Catharine Maria Sedgwick Symposium, Stockbridge, MA, June 9, 2022.

• Fitzmyer, Kyle. “Elizabeth Oakes Smith’s Dramatic Trial of Political Dissent,” presented at the panel “Oakes Smith’s Feminist ‘50s” at the American Literature Association conference, Boston, MA, July 9, 2021.

• Pelaez, Heriberto. “The Inspiration for Zenobia Re-evaluated,” presented virtually at the panel “Oakes Smith’s Feminist ‘50s” at the American Literature Association conference, July 9, 2021.

• Scherman, Timothy H. “The Political Economy of Early Feminist Journalism: the Disappearance of The Egeria, and the Birth of The Una, January 1853,” presented at the panel “Oakes Smith’s Feminist ‘50s” at the American Literature Association conference, Boston MA, July 9, 2021.

• Scherman, Timothy H. "Contesting the Uncontested: Race and Revision in The Bald Eagle." American Literature Association Conference, San Francisco CA, May 2018.

• Scherman, Timothy H.. "Uh, Captain--What Captain? Recovering the Publishing Context of Oakes Smith's The Western Captive." American Literature Association Conference, San Francisco CA, May 2016.

• Scherman, Timothy H.. "Oakes Smith Returns to Maine: 'The Defeated Life,' Katahdin, and the Dangers of Biographical Criticism." Gorman Lecture Series, Yarmouth History Center, North Yarmouth ME, June 10, 2014.

• Jaroff, Rebecca. “To Understand the Hidden Things”: Uncovering the Gothic, Recovering the Aesthetic, in Elizabeth Oakes Smith’s ‘The Sinless Child.’” 2013. (A version of this full-length essay was presented at the American Literature Association Conference, San Francisco, CA May 2018).

• Scherman, Timothy H.. "Smooth Words in Catherine Maria Sedgwick's 'Letter to Charles Butler' and Oakes Smith's 'Dignity of Labor.'" Paper delivered at the Catherine Maria Sedgwick Society Symposium, St. Louis MO, June 2013.

• Scherman, Timothy H.. "She Can Play Ball: Rhetorical Power in Oakes Smith's 'The Dignity of Labor.'" Paper delivered as part of a panel entitled "Teachers, Preachers and Speechifiers: Nineteenth-Century Women's Public Voices," Society for the Study of American Women Writers Conference, Philadelphia PA, October 2009.

• Kent, Holly. "'The Daughter of a New Era:' Antebellum Feminist Discourse in Oakes Smith's Bertha and Lily." Typescript of a paper delivered at the International Conference of the Society for the Study of American Women Writers, Philadelphia PA, November 2006.

• Ray, Angela. "Performing Womanhood: The Lyceum Lectures of Elizabeth Oakes Smith." Typescript of a paper delivered at the International Conference of the Society for the Study of American Women Writers, Philadelphia PA, November 2006.

• Scherman, Timothy H.. "Onward: New Paths of Inquiry for the Future of Oakes Smith Studies." Typescript of a paper delivered at the International Conference of the Society for the Study of American Women Writers, Philadelphia PA, November 2006.

• Jaroff, Rebecca. "'My Lips Grow Mute:' Voicing Power in Elizabeth Oakes Smith's Old New York." Unpublished MS, from a paper delivered at the International Conference of the Society for the Study of American Women Writers, Philadelphia PA, November 2006.

Last Updated: 05.15.2023