Eliza Wharton as Psyche in Hannah Webster Foster's THE COQUETTE

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Note

Notes

1. Bontatibus provides this summary of the novel's historical referent:

In 1797 Hannah Webster Foster, a Massachusetts author, published her sentimental reading of a real-life scandal that centered on the daughter of a well-known minister in Hartford, Connecticut, during 1788. The Coquette; or, The History of Eliza Wharton was loosely based on the life of Elizabeth Whitman, who tragically died on July 25, 1788, after giving birth to a stillborn child. Alone and unmarried, she became the subject of controversy, especially because little was known about the father of the child. Foster published her epistolary novel based on the scandal with Eliza Wharton cast as the heroine. (188-89)