The SSAWW-Pacific Northwest Study Group met at Whitworth University on October 18. Organized by LuElla D’Amico, the meeting was devoted to a discussion of Elizabeth Duquette and Cheryl Tevlin’s recent edition of Elizabeth Stuart Phelps’s stories, essays, and poems. Elizabeth Duquette was at the meeting and shared her insights with us. She explained that Phelps’s papers are scattered among several archives, making study of her work more difficult.

Phelps is an underrated writer (one of the topics of our conversation). Although she was famous and popular in her time, her reputation has revived with The Story of Avis, The Gates Ajar, and Doctor Zay, but not far enough. I’m especially interested because my first chapter of BItter Tastes discusses several of her works.