Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Cushmania Subject The topic of the resource Cushman, Charlotte Saunders, 1816-1876 Stebbins, Emma, 1815-1882 Gossip--Published Gossip--Private Relationships--Networks Italy--Rome Description An account of the resource A collection of archival material (letters, diaries, articles, auto/biographical accounts) collected from different archives (cf. <a href="https://www.archivalgossip.com/sources/archives/">list</a>) that showcase the life of Charlotte Cushman, one of the most successful US American actresses of the nineteenth century. We invite you to either look for specific items via the tag cloud at the bottom of the page or the search function at the top, <a href="https://archivalgossip.com/collection/items/browse?collection=1" target="_blank" rel="noopener">browse all items</a> in this collection, or explore thematic compilations of selected items in our "<a href="https://archivalgossip.com/collection/exhibits" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Exhibits</a>." <h6 style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://archivalgossip.com/collection/files/original/c4226e025914fe32ca1542c728bd11cc.JPG"><img title="Item Locations" alt="Item Locations" src="https://archivalgossip.com/collection/files/original/c4226e025914fe32ca1542c728bd11cc.JPG" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="349.5" height="237.5" /></a>(<a href="http://hdlab.stanford.edu/palladio/">Palladio</a> visualization, Dec 2021: location of items in collection, size nodes)</h6> <h6 style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://archivalgossip.com/collection/files/original/44bccce1e23bf9efe34d0078d3cc97f0.JPG"><img title="Item Locations" alt="Item Locations" src="https://archivalgossip.com/collection/files/original/44bccce1e23bf9efe34d0078d3cc97f0.JPG" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="349.5" height="324.5" /></a>(<a href="http://hdlab.stanford.edu/palladio/">Palladio</a> visualization, Dec 2021: letter correspondence for items that have values defined for "location sender" AND "location recipient," size nodes)</h6> Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Library of Congress New York Public Library Philadelphia Historical Society Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1816-00-00/1920-00 Person An individual. Sex Male Nationality US-American Occupation journalist writer editor Admin Comment Comments for further research, pending questions, tasks that still have to be completed sentimental feelings for CC (29): "Assuring readers of Charlotte Cushman's "Private virtues," despite her public profession, and acknowledging his own 'sentimental' feelings for her, Fisher's article located her within the competing value systems that framed gender expectations at the time." -->article New Yorker, 27 August 1836, 367. editor of the New Yorker (29) private correspondence between Fisher and CC: Sept 13, 1836, CCP, 11:3312 + Oct 7+8, 1836, CCP, vol. 2 (goodbye note, hurt feelings?) not yet transcribed, cf. CCP "Charlotte was more pragmatic than Fisher: while she would gladly supplement her income by writing, acting was potentially the highest paid profession a woman could enter. However much she enjoyed writing poetry and short pieces of fiction, with her entire family dependent upon her income, she could hardly afford to devote time to developing her "character," despite the fact that Fisher's "admiration" for her had made him, for eighteen months, he said, go to bed each night "the victim of [his] monomania." Besides, Charlotte enjoyed performing and its promise for financial and social independence. Furthermore, whether she ever shared Fisher's feelings for her is open to question. The tone of her letters to him, far from referring to "monomania" or reciprocal attachment, are merely matter-of-fact. And so, having a taste of the theater, Charlotte Cushman was determined to continue. Yet Charlotte's ability with words was a marketable resource she could draw upon when she needed. […] her use of the popular press and literary forms to provide a social context for her self-fashionings enabled her to transform some of the predominant attitudes about women performers. Following Fisher's suggestion, Charlotte started a correspondence that grew into a friendship with Godey's Lady's Book editor Sarah Josepha Hale. Soon Cushman's poetry and short stories appeared on the pages of Godey's and of the Ladies Companion magazine. The virtue and vices of actual performers (and their fictional counterparts) were featured regularly in the columns of contemporary periodicals and in novels. Fiction and the popular periodical press were, therefore, sites on which images of "the actress" were being shaped and debated. While Charlotte was "constructing" herself onstage, her poetry and short stories would feed the popular interest in actors' lives and put her name before a wider audience.  The demure, "ladylike" pieces she published under her name could help create a public persona audiences might recognize and equate with the actress." (Merrill 34–35) "So, while availing herself of E. Burke Fisher's help, the twenty-year-old actress was taking her own career firmly in hand. In addition to writing to editor Sarah Josepha Hale and theatrical manager Francis Wemyss herself, Charlotte appealed also to William Dinneford, the manager of the Franklin Theatre in New York, and to his partner, William Rufus Blake, manager of the Pearl Street Theatre in Albany." (Merrill 37)    -->really, she mentioned him like that to Jewsbury???  cf. Item 158, Jewsbury just mentions the time before England and a man CC was attracted to, no evidence yet found that this man was Burke Secondary Texts: Comments Secondary sources that have explicitly commented on the respective item or raised important concerns/questions that are of interest "Whether or not Charlotte reciprocated his personal admiration is unknown, but undoubtedly she recognized that E. Burke Fisher's regard for her could serve her career well. For, as Charlotte became more professional, she became increasingly aware of her need to negotiate her career and offstage activities very carefully, to have some say in the public persona she was presenting. Governing the pen of one of the New York's leading critics was bound to be advantageous for her career; however, Charlotte's self-fashioning was displayed on the pages of other New York papers as well. […] The press was an important platform for creating as well as reporting public opinion. And theatrical careers, which depended on public support and sanction, were made and broken in the press." (Merrill 30) "Whether or not Cushman was actually hurt by Fisher's rejection, it provided her and her later biographers with a convenient narrative to 'explain' her decision to remain unmarried and unattached emotionally to any other future male suitors. After her death, when Charlotte Cushman's choice to live in passionate relationships with women came to be regarded with suspicion, the suggestion that Cushman had been 'jilted' by an unnamed suitor with dishonorable intentions – a story Charlotte repeated to her friend, the novelist Geraldine Jewsbury – was frequently reprinted as a justification for Charlotte's avoidance of relationships with men. Although the 'young man' in the incident Jewsbury recounted was not identified, the time and relationship described correspond with this incident with Fisher. Charlotte Cushman's 'dishonorable suitor' story unmasked most powerfully the myth of male chivalry and protection." (Merrill 37) "Her reputation was enhanced, also, by her well-known solicitude for her family and the probity of her private life. Although her fondness for masculine roles (she appeared in more than thirty) caused some comment, no breath of scandal ever touched her name. A brief girlhood engagement and a short-lived love affair in 1836 exhaust her romantic history. Reared as a Unitarian, she was a person of deep, nondoctrinaire religious feeling. A great actress who also abided by the Vistorian code of womanly behavior inevitably appealed to a wide public" (Kleinfield, <a href="https://books.google.de/books?id=rVLOhGt1BX0C&pg=RA2-PA127&lpg=RA2-PA127&dq=happy+women+1913+powell&source=bl&ots=mcCEkPQcjg&sig=ACfU3U1t-tHXO_btUJ_IY9aGzMAo5Cd1rw&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjYnq7F8OnnAhWHTcAKHbWJCr8Q6AEwDHoECAkQAQ#v=onepage&q=charlotte%20cushman&f=false">"Charlotte Cushman"</a> 424) Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Edmund Burke Fisher Subject The topic of the resource Journalists/Writers Relationships--Networks Description An account of the resource Fisher works as an editor and writer, for the New Yorker among others. He regularly presents himself as an admirer and suitor of <a href="https://www.archivalgossip.com/collection/items/show/1" title="Charlotte Cushman">Cushman</a>. He actively shapes her career by facilitating business contacts and expanding Cushman social capital. Type The nature or genre of the resource Person Reference Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 0130 admirers gender norms/bending press coverage public image (active) social capital women's jobs