Charles Brockden Brown, Edgar Huntly; or, Memoirs of a Sleep-Walker

Hilary Emmett (University of East Anglia)

Ed. by Scott Slawinski, Western Michigan University
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 3.2.2: American (US) Writing and Culture: The Nineteenth Century, 1783-1900.
Vol. editors: Emory Elliott (University of California, Riverside), Stephen E. Meats (Pittsburg State University)

Dates

First circulation or publication 1799

Places

United States (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Epistolary
Novel

Resources

Edgar Huntly (1799) was the fourth of seven novels produced by Charles Brockden Brown in an extraordinary feat of literary productivity between 1798 and 1801. Set in the immediate past of 1787, the year of the ratification of the United States’ Constitution, the novel engages the myriad issues and divisions still facing the new Republic, from Old World class divisions and “Woldwinite” theories of social reform to frontier violence and the “Indian Question”. These issues are explored within a complex and at times fantastical narrative that Brown explicitly presents as the first work of an American “Gothic” tradition.

The novel’s oft-discussed opening address “To the Public” lays out what may be …

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2521 words

Citation: Emmett, Hilary. "Edgar Huntly; or, Memoirs of a Sleep-Walker". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 12 October 2015 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=5441, accessed 22 November 2024.]

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