Hagar Lyndon: Or, A Woman’s Rebellion

Lizzie Holmes’s 1893 novel Hagar Lyndon was way ahead of its time. Radical, even. The novel tells the story of a young woman who refuses to conform to 19th century gender norms. After observing the effects of domestic abuse on her mother and older sister, Hagar Lyndon decides she does not want to marry. She does want to be a mother, however. Hagar’s choice to live as an unwed mother forms the central dramatic conflict of the novel, as she learns that freedom comes at a cost and tradition is a vicious beast to slay. Originally serialized in the tiny anarchic newspaper Lucifer the Light-Bearer (published out of Kansas), this is the first time the novel has been published in book form and made available to a wider audience.