Secret Revealed: The Importance of the Epistolary Form

For my other grad course I’m taking this semester, I’m presenting on the epistolary novel.  Hence, it is probably not that surprising that I have decided to discuss Secret History: or, The Horrors of St. Domingo in connection to it being an “epistolary novel.”  Now, I put “epistolary novel” in scare quotes because I was struck with the fact that Gretchen Woertendyke refused to discuss Secret History as an epistolary novel but insisted upon referring to it as belonging to the genre of secret history.  I do not have a problem with Woertendyke discussing Secret History in relation to this genre, but I do have an issue with Woertendyke’s refusal to also discuss Secret History as an epistolary novel since I think by limiting herself to only viewing Secret History as a secret history that she missed crossing literary boundaries of genre that would have enriched her analysis.  In fact, Woertendyke only mentions “epistolary novel” once in her fifth footnote in a brief attempt to explain that she is focusing on “secret history” instead of “novel” because she feels as though “secret history” is often buried in “a footnote or otherwise secondary characteristic” (267-68).  However, this is exactly what she does with “epistolary novel.”  What I would like to do in this blog is to point out briefly just a few connections to the epistolary novel that I think could have benefited Woertendyke’s article.

Woertendyke states, “Sansay draws attention to the space between conceptual categories, of private and public, and geopolitical landscapes, of Early America and Early Haiti” (262).  One of the great aspects of epistolary novels is their ability to have a fictional writer/narrator of the letters address another fictional character within the private sphere of letters but with the author of the novel having the full knowledge that these “private letters” will be read by a public audience.  Furthermore, the fictional writer of a letter is transcribing their own personalized and private interpretation of events for a specific fictional audience.  The author of the novel must not only keep this in mind but must also consider how the public audience might respond to these “private” letters.  Furthermore, letters may travel across oceans, states, nations, or to the house next door; thus, letters themselves are not stationary but are mobile.  By considering the epistolary form, Sansay is able to embed these complexities of public and private within the genre of the epistolary novel. 

Furthermore, many critics have been fascinated, and rightly so, with Sansay’s depictions of men and women’s relationships.  Again, it is important to consider the epistolary novel since as Theresa Gaul points out that many women did not have opportunity to publish books or novels so instead many women wrote letters (265).  The form of an epistolary novel provided Sansay with the opportunity to transform her “private” letters into a novel for the “public.”  As scholars have discussed, Sansay took her own private life and used it as the basis for her novel.  Thus, I believe ignoring the form Sansay chose to publish her novel in is a mistake that can cause many important connections to be missed.  I think the points and observations to be made are too numerous for one blog post, but hopefully, we as scholars can cross the literary divide between secret history and epistolary novel in order to enrich our understandings (and refuse the urge to bury either one in a footnote).