Background
Jewett's family had been residents of New England for many generations.
Jewett's family had been residents of New England for many generations.
She published her first important story in the Atlantic Monthly at age 19. Jewett possessed a keen descriptive gift that William Dean Howells called "an uncommon feeling for talk — I hear your people." Some of Jewett's poetry was collected in Verses (1916), and she also wrote three children's books.
She was never overtly religious, but after she joined the Episcopalian church in 1871, she explored less conventional religious ideas.
Quotations: A harbor, even if it is a little harbor, is a good thing, since adventurers come into it as well as go out, and the life in it grows strong, because it takes something from the world, and has something to give in return.
Jewett never married; but she established a close friendship with writer Annie Fields and her husband, publisher James Thomas Fields, editor of the Atlantic Monthly.