Brown,CharlesBrockden

Abstract

Charles Brockden Brown (1771–1810) has been characterized not only as the inventor of the American Gothic (Kafer 2004: xi) but also as the father of the American Romance novel (Levine 1989: 29) and America's first professional writer (Verhoeven 1992: 203) (see american gothic ). Brown further has been hailed as a pioneering American feminist (Verhoeven 1992: 203), historian, and political theorist (Carpenter 1981: 221). Today, he is remembered primarily for his four Gothic novels, Wieland; or The Transformation. An American Tale (1798); Ormond; or The Secret Witness (1799); Arthur Mervyn; or, Memoirs of the Year 1793 (part I 1799, part II 1800); and Edgar Huntly; or, Memoirs of a Sleep‐Walker (1799), in which he adapted to his post‐Revolutionary American setting conventions of the European Gothic novel associated with Ann Radcliffe and Matthew Lewis (see european gothic ). Brown's literary output, however, also included an important discussion of women's rights and marriage, Alcuin: A Dialogue (1798); two epistolary sentimental novels, Clara Howard (1801) and Jane Talbot (1801); an unfinished Gothic novel, Memoirs of Carwin the Biloquist (1803–1805); and another unfinished novel, Memoirs of Stephen Calvert (1799–1800), combining elements of the romance and sentimental novel. As editor of and a primary contributor to the Monthly Magazine and American Review (1799–1800), The Literary Magazine and American Register (1803–1806), and The American Register and General Repository of History, Politics, and Science (1807–9), as well as a frequent contributor to other magazines of the day, Brown published prolifically on many topics and also authored several important political pamphlets, including one arguing for acquisition of the Louisiana Territory. During the last years of his life, Brown translated and annotated a geographical study of the United States by French author Comte de Volney and was at work on a geographical study titled System of General Geography; Containing a Topological, Statistical, and Descriptive Survey of the Earth . He is credited with having influenced authors including James Fenimore Cooper, Edgar Allan Poe, and Nathanial Hawthorne.