Catharine Sedgwick's The Linwoods

After the Revolutionary War had concluded, America’s problems as a nation had truly begun. Winning the war was relatively easy in comparison to the amount of cultural and governmental turmoil it would need to endure during its separation from Britain. This is particularly evident in the literature written shortly after the Revolutionary War, as it was often filled with these struggles of national identity and independence. One of the most potent examples of this is Catharine Sedgwick’s novel, The Linwoods: or, “Sixty Years Since” in America—not only because it is written shortly after the Revolutionary War, but because it is written about the Revolutionary War, and how colonial American culture and war-time culture was viewed after the war …show more content…
In the closing of the novel, in fact, Sedgwick asks for her young readers, “to imitate our heroine in trusting to the honourable resources of virtue and talent, and a joint stock of industry and frugality, in a country that is sure to smile upon these qualities, and reward them with as much worldly prosperity as is necessary to happiness, and safe to virtue” (2: 286). While this is part of a larger plea for her readers to marry and love for the proper reasons, it is also laced with Sedgwick’s ideas of the values of the new nation. VanDette expands on this in her essay, stating, “[Sedgwick] sought to bring together the republican values of virtue, selflessness, and patriotism, and the democratic principles of equality, opportunity, and independence” (VanDette 51). But more importantly, Sedgwick asks her readers to imitate her heroine, and allows for her readers to use the her characters in the novel as guides for proper conduct, as they demonstrate the principles and characteristics that Americans should strive for when searching for their new, independent