SOURCE: Petter, Henri. “The Pernicious Novels Exposed: Female Quixotism.” In The Early American Novel, pp. 46-59. Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1971.

In the following essay, Petter emphasizes Tenney's didactic tone in Female Quixotism.

Mrs. Tabitha Tenney published in 1801 a novel modeled after Don Quixote and meant to be a warning against romantic fiction: Female Quixotism: Exhibited in the Romantic Opinions and Extravagant Adventures of Dorcasina Sheldon. Dorcasina has been reading too many novels ever since she was a young girl; as a result she has imbibed notions difficult to conciliate with the demands made on her by a normal existence among people not similarly influenced by novel-reading.¹

From the outset Mrs. Tenney's heroine is predisposed to respond to all the dangerous influences that may be conveyed by fiction. Her romantic turn of mind² conditions her attitude toward novels and, through them, toward sober life. This peculiar receptivity of...