Dime Novels for Women

We've posted previously on Golden Age Romance Comics and now here is a fine exhibit on American Women's Dime Novel: Dime Novels for Women, 1870-1920 from the Center for History and New Media, George Mason University. (At right, the cover art for When Lovely Maiden Stoops to Folly by Laura Jean Libbey.)

Dime novels originated in mid-19th c. America as cheap, fictional, tabloid publications aimed at a youthful, working-class audience. The plots were adventure-oriented and the covers grew increasingly lurid. Eventually, dime novels evolved into regular book format, but--as a rich source of popular fiction--inspired later publications such as comic books and American genres such as hard-boiled detective fiction.

According to Felicia L. Carr, the author of the online exhibit, women's dime novels examined issues of class and gender and were enormously popular and influential in the 19th c. among their working-class female audience. Carr has provided an introductory essay which examines the growth of dime novels, literacy, and women's fiction in the 19th c.

Additional links:

• Dime Novels from American Treasures of the Library of Congress
• Stanford University's Dime Novels and Penny Dreadfuls