Phelps, Elizabeth Stuart [Elizabeth Ward]

31 August 1844 - 28 January 1911

American novelist and poet (and daughter of the novelist Elizabeth Wooster Stuart Phelps), best known for The Gates Ajar [1868]. After her 1888 marriage, she was usually identified as "Mrs. Elizabeth Ward." (I can't help but observe that she went through enough name changes to give most of us an identity crisis: her birth name was Mary Gray Phelps, which was changed to Elizabeth Stuart Phelps after the death of her mother.)

Sites:
Brief biographical note
[Bedford - St. Martin's]
Brief biographical note
[Wikipedia]
Biographical note
[1911 Encyclopedia]
Biographical note
[Antiques Digest]
Brief biographical note
Empasizes her Arthurian poems. [U Rochester Library]
Biographical note
Good overview of Phelps' life, focusing on her works written for girls. [Deirdre Johnson]
Phelps Overview
From the teaching guide website for the Heath Anthology of American Literature
Biographical note
[Patricia Chadwick, PageWise]
Brief biographical note
Features access to some etexts of a couple of Phelps' works, letters, and contemporary biographical notes. [Early American Fiction, UVa Library]
Elizabeth Stuart Phelps page
Primarily bibliographical. [Paul P. Reuben, Cal State Stanislaus]


Etexts:
"The Day of My Death" this link opens a new window
From the October 1868 issue of Harper's New Monthly magazine, at Cornell U's "Making of America"
note: stories at the "Making of America" project are available in multiple formats (image, pdf, plain text). This link is to the images — e-facsimiles, basically — but other viewing options are readily available (click on a page number, then select another "View As" option).
"Number 13" this link opens a new window
A tale of premonitions and visions, from the March 1876 issue of Harper's New Monthly magazine, at the "Making of America"
see note above re: stories at the "Making of America" project
"Since I Died" this link opens a new window
A haunting if, to many modern readers, slightly maudlin tale of love beyond the grave. Read this one closely, however, paying close attention to gender references, to the rhetoric used by the tale's speaker, to the frequent references to silence and the failure of language -- it all adds up to something.... From the February 1873 issue of Scribner's Monthly magazine, at the "Making of America"
see note above re: stories at the "Making of America" project
- also at HorrorMasters (PDF)
"Stronger than Death" this link opens a new window
Another investigation, this one not quite ghostly (but barely "not quite") of love and the dead, and in an industrial context no less. From the July 1877 issue of Harper's New Monthly magazine. ["Making of America"]
see note above re: stories at the "Making of America" project
"That Never Was on Sea or Land" this link opens a new window
One of Phelps's poems, this one a gentle variation on the "spectre bridegroom" theme. From the October 1874 issue of Atlantic Monthly magazine. ["Making of America"]
see note above re: stories at the "Making of America" project

"Elizabeth Stuart Phelps."