SOURCE: "Charles Brockden Brown: Feminism in Fiction," in American Novelists Revisited: Essays in Feminist Criticism, edited by Fritz Fleishmann, G. K. Hall & Company, 1982, pp. 6-41.

In the essay that follows, Fleischmann explores Brown's "systematic treatment" of women, their rights, and their roles in his novels. Fleischmann argues strongly in favor of the view that Brown was a feminist and also advocates Brown's "competence as a writer," but notes that there is no consensus (feminist or otherwise) in Brown scholarship.

I

Charles Brockden Brown (1771-1810) is the first novelist to be considered here, because he was the first born. But it would also be appropriate, for other than chronological reasons, to place him at the beginning since he already has a long history of feminist criticism, a history that many would consider disheartening, for it has neither produced a consensus on Brown's feminism nor left much impact on his...