Harriet Beecher Stowe: A Spiritual Life

Harriet Beecher Stowe: A Spiritual LifeSo you're the little woman who started this big war, Abraham Lincoln is said to have quipped when he met Harriet Beecher Stowe. Her 1852 novel Uncle Tom's Cabin converted readers by the thousands to the anti slavery movement and served notice that the days of slavery were numbered. Overnight Stowe became a celebrity, but to defenders of slavery she was the devil in petticoats. Most writing about Stowe treats her as a literary figure and social

-So you're the little woman who started this big war, - Abraham Lincoln is said to have quipped when he met Harriet Beecher Stowe. Her 1852 novel Uncle Tom's Cabin converted readers by the thousands to the anti-slavery movement and served notice that the days of slavery were numbered. Overnight Stowe became a celebrity, but to defenders of slavery she was the devil in petticoats.
Most writing about Stowe treats her as a literary figure and social reformer while downplaying her Christian faith. But Nancy Koester's biography highlights Stowe's faith as central to her life -- both her public fight against slavery and her own personal struggle through deep grief to find a gracious God. Having meticulously researched Stowe's own writings, both published and un-published, Koester traces Stowe's faith pilgrimage from evangelical Calvinism through spiritualism to Anglican spirituality in a flowing, compelling narrative.
Watch a 2014 interview with the author of this book here:


Binding Type: Paperback
Publisher: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company
Published: 01/13/2014
ISBN: 9780802833044
Pages: 371
Weight: 1.20lbs
Size: 8.95h x 6.11w x 1.01d
Award: Minnesota Book Award - Winner

Review Citations: Booklist 11/15/2013 pg. 14
Christian Century 04/30/2014 pg. 48
Choice 09/01/2014 pg. 95