| Whether cautioning about the dangers associated with undervaluing such attachments or commemorating the rewards of successfully negotiated intimacies, American women novelists attribute transformative powers to adult, platonic, intimate female friendships. Via close readings of Elizabeth Stuart Phelps's The Silent Partner (1871), Kate Chopin's The Awakening (1899), Nella Larsen's Quicksand (1928), Sherley Anne Williams's Dessa Rose (1986), and Barbara Kingsolver's The Bean Trees (1988), this project discerns a trend: these novelists envision intimate female friendships as encouraging exploration often inhibited within other relationships, as challenging conventional sources of authority, and as playing a vital role in shaping ethical perspectives. |
