Includes bibliographical references (pages 235-265) and index.
Contents
Changing the story. The borderlands of a culture ; Making a change ; Reading writing and arithmetic ; Changing the story ; Essentialism and its discontents -- Men reading and writing women/women reading and writing men. Dreiser and the discourse of gender ; Mark Twain and women ; An interview with Maxine Hong Kingston ; The Bondwoman's Escape -- Humor and chutzpah. Feminist humor and Charlotte Perkins Gilman -- Theresa Malkiel's Diary of a shirtwaist striker -- Erica Jong.