Clara Louise Burnham (1854–1927)

from the NYTimes, October 13, 1895:

The scene of "The Wise Woman" is laid partly at Pokonet, on the south shore of Long Island, (it must be somewhere near Southampton) and partly in a suburban place in New-Jersey, called Montaigne, which is either Orange or Montclair. Its personages are all living, human beings, who, though they talk a great deal, for this is essentially a conversational novel, yet talk brightly and well. The wise woman is a spinster of wealth and social position, who understands human nature thoroughly, and has a large share of, executive skill.

The materials of the story are all of the simplest possible description. Intrigue enters no more conspicuously into the daily life of its characters than it enters into the lives of common humanity. There are two heroines, at least, and perhaps a few more, and two or three heroes, not one of whom is splendidly heroic, or differs in any respect from the ordinary well-educated, well-behaved, and well-dressed New-York young man.

In such a book love is not a burning, blazing passion, and Queens and soldiers do not play deep with hearts. But, though "Cleopatra lives at Number Seven and Anthony resides in Brunswick Square," and both are deplorably decent, we fancy that the ordinary novel reader will find this work vastly entertaining. It involves as clear and true a picture of our rather petty, but clean and wholesome, social life as any given in recent fiction. It is a long while since Mr. Howells produced a book so fresh and natural as this. It touches a with playful satire upon American social pretensions, and the episode of the French milliner and her half-brother, the machinist, is full of quiet humor. The French milliner, by the way, is a Michigan girl, whose ancestors were Long Islanders. She and her half-brother can trace their lineage clear back to 1640 or thereabout. This fact is very gratifying in the end to that portion of society in Orange which severely snubbed them at first. It is a good point, too. Few of us can equal the Long Island farmer in this respect. He generally can tell you the name of his great-grandfather's great-grandfather.… (más)