Princeton University professor emerita Elaine Showalter presents the first comprehensive history of American women writers from 1650 to 2000. Showalter introduces us to over 250 female writers, some famous (Harriet Beecher Stowe, Dorothy Parker) and some who were once successful but now little known (Catherine Sedgwick and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Susan Glaspell), and shows how these writers were connected to one another and to their times.