Table of Contents

Introduction: 'Muses With Pens'. Part 1 British Women's Prose Epics: Romancing the epic: Lady Mary Wroth's Urania and literary traditions, Sheila Cavanagh; Female heroic action in Frances Burney's Camilla, Elizabeth Kraft; Virginia Woolf and the modern epic, Karla Alwes; Epic form and (re)vision in Rebecca West's Black Lamb and Grey Falcon, Bernard Schweizer. Part 2 British Women's Verse Epics: Gendering Telemachus: Anna Seward and the epic rewriting of Fenelon's Telemaque, Adeline Johns-Putra; The female epic and the journey towards self-definition in Mary Tighe's Psyche, Debnita Chakravarti; 'Hear the voice of the [female] bard': Aurora Leigh as a female romantic epic, Peggy Dunn Bailey. Part 3 American Women's Verse Epics: The daughters of Penelope: tradition and innovation in American epics by women, Alan Jalowitz; Revisionary heroism in Gwendolyn Brooks's Annie Allen, Jenny Goodman; Against the fathers' amnesia: Sharon Doubiago, Hard Country, and women's epic, Jeremy Downes. Bibliography; Index.

About the Author

Bernard Schweizer is Assistant Professor of English at Long Island University, USA.