The Irish stories of Sarah Orne Jewett

The Irish Stories of Sarah Orne Jewett. Jack Morgan and Louis Renza, Editors. Carbondale: Southern Illinois UP, 1996. iii + 149 pages. $24.95 cloth. Editors Jack Morgan and Louis Renza made a wise choice when they decided to compile and publish Sarah Orne Jewett's short stories on the Irish immigrant experience of America, a task she had planned on doing in her own lifetime. From "The Luck of the Brogans" to "The Gray Mills of Farley" to "Elleneen," Jewett's stories offer an alternative, more sympathetic response to Irish experience than any of her other major contemporaries. Moreover, the depictions of the interactions between Irish immigrants and earlier British immigrants provide an interesting commentary on the varying stages of assimilation to the United States. The editors also provide an introduction, a combination of autobiographical research and theoretical discussion, which offers credibility to the validity of Jewett's stories and what they represent. In their introduction, Morgan and Renza document Jewett's investment and interest in Ireland by pointing to her life and letters. Jewett, it turns out, visited Ireland during her lifetime as well as procured Irish domestic help in her house. This personal experience no doubt influenced her sympathies and expanded the understanding of Jewett as a regional writer. Indeed, one of the things the editors appreciate so much about Jewett's Irish stories is that they display her "willingness to question regionalist ideology as a possible critical alternative to the country's invasive, federalist materialistic culture." In other words, in these stories, the author uses the attraction of regionalism to provide security to the insecure immigrants; instead of being overwhelmed by the anxiety of urban industrialism and capitalism, Irish immigrants in Jewett's stories are offered a community, much like that of Dunnet Landing in The Country of the Pointed Firs. Indeed, as a community of their own, the Irish represent a "regionalist ally," a self-contained region defined by ethnicity. The storied included in this collection vary from quaint and charming to profound and disturbing. For example, "A Little Captive Maid" tells the story of a girl, Nora, who leaves Ireland in order to provide for her family by making money in America; throughout her stay at Captain Balfour's house, Nora's genuinely warm nature revives the Captain and touches him so deeply that he leaves Nora enough money in his will to send her back to Ireland. The story is quaint and yet Jewett takes the opportunity to ask, "Who had stopped to think of the family sorrow of losing loved ones to America from Ireland?" or to personalize the situation. On a broader level, Jewett mourns for the country as well: "Poor Ireland, who gives her best to the busy countries over seas, and longs for the time when she can be rich and busy herself, and keep the young people at home and happy in field and town." Jewett's empathy and understanding seem remarkably deep. There are similar stories of compassion in "A Landlocked Sailor" and "Bold Words at the Bridge." Ultimately, the connection between people, regardless of nationality (although undoubtedly because of it as well), permeates all of Jewett's Irish stories. Whether it is the bond between country people or the sympathy felt for the immigrants because of their sense of alienation, Jewett's characters help each other through the estrangement and hardships that all must endure. …