William Dean Howells 
Heroines of Fiction, Volume 1 (Barnes & Noble Digital Library) 

Published in two volumes, Howells’s studies in the great heroines of nineteenth century English-language fiction make delightful reading. This first volume takes the reader from Fanny Burney’s unforgettable Evelina to the Bronte sisters’ remarkable Jane and Catherine. Along the way, female protagonists from the works of Edgeworth, Austen,  Radcliffe, Scott,  Dickens, Hawthorne,  and Thackeray, among others,  are closely and keenly observed.

About the author

William Dean Howells (1837-1920) was an American novelist and critic.  He edited the Atlantic Monthly from 1871-1881, where he championed literary realism and advanced the careers of such important American writers as Mark Twain, Stephen Crane, and Henry James.  His best known novel is The Rise of Silas Lapham (1885).