Washington Irving and the Fantasy of Masculinity: Escaping the Woman Within. By Heinz Tschachler. Jefferson, NC: McFarland. 2022. x, 275 pp. Cloth, $45.00.
Drawing on Jungian concepts of anima and animus, or feminine and masculine personality types, this study argues that the male figures in Washington Irving’s body of work are “masculine archetypal images” that the author developed to compensate for his “feminine personality components.” Irving’s “feminine masculinity” is apparent in his use of pseudonymous identities as a form of self-concealment. Tschachler tracks Irving’s struggle with masculinity as a series of responses to shifting notions of manhood that correspond with political and economic changes in the United States during the first half of the nineteenth century.
Gems of Art on Paper: Illustrated American Fiction and Poetry, 1785–1885. By Georgia Brady Barnhill. Amherst: Univ. of Massachusetts Press. 2021. xx, 288 pp. Cloth, $32.95.
Focusing on the impact that illustrators...
