The family acquired a few scars along the way; one Beecher died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound that may not have been accidental, and another came to believe that she would lead the world after an imminent revolution in gender politics took place. The effects of rigid and patriarchal religious training were less obvious in Harriet's case, but modern scholars have conjectured that in her novels she tried to adapt and regender her father's ministerial authority.
As a teenaged member of Lyman Beecher's crowded household, Harriet was a voracious reader noted for her prodigious memory but a quiet girl who did not often impress outsiders as brilliant or witty. Her father saw her special qualities but had trouble appreciating them in a daughter. "Harriet is a great genius," he avowed, in a private letter. "I would give a hundred dollars if she was a boy & Henry a girl--She is as odd as she is intelligent & studious. . . ." Genius or not, Harriet was educated at minimal expense and in a manner that rested entirely on Catharine's devotion to her younger sister's gifts.
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