Charlotte Temple

Rowson, Mrs., 1762-1824Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.1

Word count: 210K words
Chapters: 21

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Charlotte Temple by Mrs. RowsonAuthor: Rowson, Mrs., 1762-1824,Language: English, Class: PS: Language and Literatures: American and Canadian literature, Release Date: Mar 12, 2006

Editor's review

Charlotte Temple is one of the most widely read sentimental novels of early American fiction. In spare narrative prose, Mrs. Rowson tells the tragedy of young Charlotte, who leaves boarding school for society and meets seduction and abandonment. The book's value lies not in narrative complexity but in the anxieties it registers in late-eighteenth-century Anglo-American society over female chastity, family authority, and moral education; it is a direct text for understanding the origins of the American novel and the sentimental tradition. The Project Gutenberg edition is a public-domain e-book, easy to search and cite, suitable as a classroom supplement or research material. Readers might place it back in its historical context: the characters are nearly typological and the plot carries an evident didactic intent; watch how the narrator intervenes in the story and guides the reader toward sympathy and warning. Read with modern eyes, the plot may seem plain, but precisely for that reason it is a clear sample for observing the narrative mode of early moral fiction.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Undergraduates and graduate students studying early American literature and the origins of the novel
Researchers interested in eighteenth-century representations of women and the sentimental tradition
Teachers who need a public-domain English text for classroom discussion or citation
General readers interested in the Anglo-American tradition of moral-didactic fiction

Not a good fit for

Contemporary fiction readers who prefer complex plots and psychological depth
Readers expecting fast-paced narrative or strong dramatic conflict
Beginners with weaker English reading skills who need annotated support

Reading tips

Read a background introduction to early American fiction first, then the text; its didactic intent becomes easier to grasp.
Pay attention to the narrator's comments and interruptions; they are key to the book's moral framework.
Read it alongside other sentimental novels of the period to observe repetition and variation in the theme of female chastity.
Take notes on each of Charlotte's key choices and trace how the tragedy is driven step by step to its end.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

How difficult is the English, and is it suitable for non-native readers?

The English is late-eighteenth-century; sentence structure and vocabulary are generally not abstruse, but some spelling and expressions differ from modern English, and there are no annotations. Non-native readers with college-level English reading ability can get through it with a dictionary; those who need detailed background notes should use an edition with an introduction or learn the historical background first.

What are the features of the Project Gutenberg edition?

It is a public-domain e-book, with text from Project Gutenberg, easy to obtain free, search in full text, and cite. It usually contains no modern scholarly introduction or detailed annotations, so it suits readers who already have some background knowledge and need the original text, rather than beginners who need systematic explanation.

How does reading this book help in understanding American literary history?

Charlotte Temple is a widely circulated work of early American fiction and embodies the sentimental novel and the moral-didactic tradition. It helps readers recognize themes, character types, and narrative methods common in the formative period of the American novel; it is a text often mentioned in literary history courses, but it should not be treated as the sole representative.

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About the author

Rowson, Mrs., 1762-1824 Author · American · 1762–1824

Mrs. Rowson (1762–1824) was an Anglo-American novelist, playwright, and educator active in the early years of the United States. Born in England and later moving to America, she worked on both sides of the Atlantic. She is best known for her novel Charlotte Temple, a sentimental tale of a young woman whose love and seduction lead to tragedy. With its tightly woven plot and intense emotion, the book became one of the more widely read early American novels and influenced later American sentimental fiction and its female readership. Besides fiction, she wrote for the theater and devoted herself to women's education; her writing and teaching together reflect the active role of Anglo-American women in literature and society in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Because public information is limited, details of her life cannot be fully described, yet Charlotte Temple alone secures her place in early American literary history.