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by Susan Bogert Warner

Susan Bogert Warner (1819-1885), was an American evangelical writer of religious fiction, children's fiction, and theological works. She wrote, under the name of "Elizabeth Wetherell, " thirty novels, many of which went into multiple editions. However, her first novel, The Wide, Wide World (1850), was the most popular. It was translated into several other languages, including: French, German, and Dutch. Other than Uncle Tom's Cabin, it was perhaps the most widely circulated story of American authorship. In the nineteenth-century, critics admired the depictions of rural American life in her early novels. Early twentieth-century critics classified Warner's work as "sentimental" and thus lacking in literary value. In the later twentieth century, feminist critics rediscovered The Wide, Wide World, discussing it as a quintessential domestic novel and focusing on analyzing its portrayal of gender dynamics. Some of her works were written jointly with her younger sister Anna Bartlett Warner, who sometimes wrote under the pseudonym "Amy Lothrop." Her other works include: Queechy (1852), The Law and the Testimony (1853), The Hills of the Shatemuc (1856), The Old Helmet (1863), and Melbourne House (1864).

258 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1873

About the author

Born in 1819 in New York City, American novelist and children's author Susan Bogert Warner was the daughter of lawyer Henry Warner, and his wife, Anna Bartlett. Her early life was one of wealth and privilege, until her father lost his money in the Panic of 1837, and the family were forced to sell their home in St. Mark's Place (NYC), and move to a farmhouse they owned on Constitution Island, near West Point, NY.

Warner and her sister, Anna Bartlett Warner (author of the well-known children's hymn, Jesus Loves Me, This I Know), began writing in 1849, in order to improve their family's financial situation. Their work, for both children and adults, was largely evangelical. Susan Bogert Warner is primarily remembered for her debut novel, The Wide, Wide World (1850), although she wrote close to thirty additional titles, all under the pseudonym 'Elizabeth Wetherell."