Many people are unaware that The Atlantic used to be The Atlantic Monthly.

One of the most prominent features of The Atlantic Monthly during the 1890s was the diversity of texts. The first piece in Issue 494 of Volume 82, December 1898, states that The Atlantic Monthly is “A Magazine of Literature, Science, Art and Politics,” indicating the variety of texts seen in the table of contents is not a unique feature of this issue. Although it is a December issue, I found it peculiar that more than one text dealt with summer. W.D. Howells’ Confessions of a Summer Colonist is a reflection about the few months Howells spent on a settlement in the East Coast. Even the poem, “Summer Died Last Night” by Maude Caldwell Perry, which follows Howells’ piece, poeticizes the transition between summer and autumn. There were multiple poems in this issue, which I found quite surprising, and there was even a quatrain sandwiched between two stories, aptly titled “Quatrain.” Among the assortment of texts, I found the short story “Ten Beautiful Years” by Mary Knight Potter, which is the one piece I chose to spend more time on.

When analyzing a story, finding background information on the author is beneficial. However, I found it difficult to find anything on Mary Knight Potter. Instead, I came across a more well-known Mary Potter who was an artist by vocation. Although not much is known about Mary Knight Potter today, she was a writer and published a collection of short stories titled Ten Beautiful Years & Other Stories. The anthology was published in 1916, much after the magazine publication, by J.B Lippincott Company, which was a publishing company founded in Philadelphia in 1836 (Freeman, 1992). The collection has a note indicating it was reprinted in part from various periodicals, The Atlantic Monthly being one of these periodicals.

The narrative arc of the story “Ten Beautiful Years” captures 1890s America through gender roles that were considered commonplace for the time. The story’s title refers to the ten years of marriage between two artists, Rob and Margaret. In short, Rob finds himself to be a failure as an artist while his wife finds success, so she steps in to give him the illusion of good fortune. Rob eventually succeeds as an artist, but upon losing Margaret, he learns of her appreciation of his work, concern over his dejection due to his failure as a painter, and her guilt for her own flourishing through her journal entries. She records selling bonds and secretly sending money to a museum in order to buy his paintings, all to console him. Rob is left with the realization that his success was all his wife’s doing.

The wife being the breadwinner instead of the husband initially seemed progressive for a 19th century text, but I noticed that despite these roles, Margaret’s deep sense of guilt appeared to be connected to an inability to tolerate unconventional gender roles. She feels unable to console him with their unusual roles, and believes: “What’s a wife good for if she can’t help at such times as this? But I feel so powerless.” Once he achieves success on his own, she says that she “never realized till all those years how strong he is, or how I–worship him! And I felt so ashamed of the stupid people who praised me instead of him.” Margaret not only fails to admit that her husband would have failed without her, but also looks down on her own accomplishments. I believe her attitude indicates an inability to accept that it is permissible for a woman to achieve more than a man. In an overwhelmingly male dominated period of time, this dominance was seen in literature and art, so Potter’s writing may be a reflection of an internalization of these societal norms.

I also examined an article, a political piece titled Our Government of Newly Acquired Territory. The title itself reflected the political and historical context of the text–this was published shortly after America’s acquisition of Puerto Rico from Spain and the annexation of Hawaii, effectively making both regions part of the United States. This text, written by Carl Evans Boyd, speaks of how the U.S. already has “considerable experience in the government of territories acquired from foreign powers,” harkening back to the numerous times the United States enlarged its boundaries, a modern example being Alaska. One of the issues associated with further expansion displays the racist sentiments of the time, arguing that in the Philippines, the U.S. “will meet a race radically different…one which has shown considerable ability in resisting the established order,” and also that “English and Dutch experience with Asiatics has shown that only the constant presence of European garrisons is sufficient to insure safety and good order” (741). These sentiments aside, Boyd ultimately calls for a sense of permanence in acquiring territory, and argues that this cannot be found in territorial organizations. Similar concerns are seen in the issue with articles concerning the tropics and control over these regions, particularly the very first article, titled The United States and the Control of the Tropics, also addressing the concerns in furthering American expansion.

This issue of the magazine lacked the illustrations I expected to see accompanying the texts. I found this surprising, since photojournalism was not rare during this time, and illustrations were common in magazines. However, I did find some illustrations in the miscellaneous back pages. These back pages were not found in the previous issues of the volume, indicating a conclusion of Volume 82. These pages had announcements from the publisher which included advertisements, a list of books that were being sold, holiday publications, current events, et cetera. As for the illustrations, these included book covers, photographs of notable people, and the writers contributing to the magazine, among several other things.

Overall, my experience of looking through a 1890s text was very enlightening. I found the variety of the texts interesting, with a fascinating focus placed on short stories and poetry–an uncommon sight today. Much of the language used is very similar to contemporary American vernacular, making it easy to understand and demonstrating that these texts from more than a century ago still have relevance today. However, I found some of the texts within this issue to be a bit more formal than the magazines of today, and the diction seemed more advanced than what is found in most contemporary texts. This suggests to me that the casual reader had a firmer grasp on the English language during the 1890s. Magazines in 1890s America, The Atlantic Monthly in particular, were certainly not targeted toward an audience that expected quick consumption and immediate gratification. These texts require a reader willing to pore over information and devote much time to reading.