Within the Gates: 'He is Almighty to so many miserable people''

By Elizabeth Stuart Phelps

Mary Gray Phelps was born on 31st August 1844 in Boston, Massachusetts.

Her mother, who wrote the Kitty Brown children’s book series, died when she was only 8. The young girl asked to be renamed in honor of her mother.

Two years later her father married her mother's sister, Mary Stuart, also a writer, but she died of tuberculosis only 18 months later. A mere six months later he married for a third time to Mary Ann Johnson, and they had two sons.

Phelps received an upper-class education through her attendance at the Abbot Academy and Mrs. Edwards' School for Young Ladies. She had a natural gift for story-telling and at 13 she had a story published in Youth's Companion and other stories in various Sunday School publications.

In most of her writings she used her mother's name ‘Elizabeth Stuart Phelps’ as a pseudonym, even after her marriage in 1888 to Herbert Dickinson Ward, a journalist (and later co-author with her) 17 years her junior. Such was her talent that she gained a wide audience from her first publications.

At age 19 she sent her Civil War story ‘A Sacrifice Consumed’ to Harper's Magazine. A generous payment was made together with a request for more works to be sent for publication.

During the 1860s she wrote her first books for children, the ‘Tiny’ series and followed up with the 4-volume ‘Gypsy Breynton’ series.

In 1868, three years after the Civil War, came ‘The Gates Ajar’, a controversial but best-selling Spiritualist work which told of an afterlife replete with home comforts and reunited families, and their pets, for eternity. Its success led her to write two more books to complete the trilogy and she was wont to use the word ‘Gates’ in later book titles to allude to this success. She stated that she wrote ‘The Gates Ajar’ to comfort a generation of women devastated by the loss of their loved ones who found no comfort in traditional religion.

Phelps became a determined advocate through her lectures and other work for social reform, temperance, women's emancipation, and even clothing reform for women, and in 1874, urging them to burn their corsets.

Her deteriorating health was now restricting some of her activities and kept her contributions to mostly literary in nature rather than public appearances.

In 1876 Phelps was the first woman to present a lecture series at Boston University. Her presentations, ‘Representative Modern Fiction’, analyzed the works of George Eliot.

In 1877 she published ‘The Story of Avis’. The work focuses on many of the era’s early feminist issues, portraying a woman's struggle to balance her married life and domestic responsibilities with her longing to become a painter. At no time did she attempt to hide, either in real life or her stories, her contempt of the inequities of the then class structure and gender disparities. Her work, ‘Mary Elizabeth’ depicts a homeless girl's choices between theft and begging as a means of survival. ‘One Way to Get An Education’ tells of a child laborer's desire for a better life than mill work offers and sees self-injuring as a way to a better education. Her work often depicted women succeeding in non-traditional careers such as physicians, ministers, and artists.

In 1884 came her well-regarded poetry collection ‘Songs of the Silent World’

Along with her husband she wrote two Biblical romances in 1890 and 1891. Her autobiography, ‘Chapters from a Life’ was serialized and then published in book form in 1896.

Phelps continued to write short stories and novels up to her death and over her life authored 57 volumes of fiction, poetry and essays.

Elizabeth Stuart Phelps died 28th January 1911, in Newton Center, Massachusetts. She was 66.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Stage Door
• Release date: Sep 1, 2021
• ISBN: 9781803540276

Book preview

Within the Gates by Elizabeth Stuart Phelps

Mary Gray Phelps was born on 31st August 1844 in Boston, Massachusetts.

Her mother, who wrote the Kitty Brown children’s book series, died when she was only 8.  The young girl asked to be renamed in honor of her mother.

Two years later her father married her mother's sister, Mary Stuart, also a writer, but she died of tuberculosis only 18 months later. A mere six months later he married for a third time to Mary Ann Johnson, and they had two sons.

Phelps received an upper-class education through her attendance at the Abbot Academy and Mrs. Edwards' School for Young Ladies. She had a natural gift for story-telling and at 13 she had a story published in Youth's Companion and other stories in various Sunday School publications.

In most of her writings she used her mother's name ‘Elizabeth Stuart Phelps’ as a pseudonym, even after her marriage in 1888 to Herbert Dickinson Ward, a journalist (and later co-author with her) 17 years her junior. Such was her talent that she gained a wide audience from her first publications.

At age 19 she sent her Civil War story ‘A Sacrifice Consumed’ to Harper's Magazine. A generous payment was made together with a request for more works to be sent for publication.

During the 1860s she wrote her first books for children, the ‘Tiny’ series and followed up with the 4-volume ‘Gypsy Breynton’ series. 

In 1868, three years after the Civil War, came ‘The Gates Ajar’, a controversial but best-selling Spiritualist work which told of an afterlife replete with home comforts and reunited families, and their pets, for eternity.  Its success led her to write two more books to complete the trilogy and she was wont to use the word ‘Gates’ in later book titles to allude to this success. She stated that she wrote ‘The Gates Ajar’ to comfort a generation of women devastated by the loss of their loved ones who found no comfort in traditional religion.

Phelps became a determined advocate through her lectures and other work for social reform, temperance, women's emancipation, and even clothing reform for women, and in 1874, urging them to burn their corsets.

Her deteriorating health was now restricting some of her activities and kept her contributions to mostly literary in nature rather than public appearances.

In 1876 Phelps was the first woman to present a lecture series at Boston University. Her presentations, ‘Representative Modern Fiction’, analyzed the works of George Eliot.

In 1877 she published ‘The Story of Avis’. The work focuses on many of the era’s early feminist issues, portraying a woman's struggle to balance her married life and domestic responsibilities with her longing to become a painter.  At no time did she attempt to hide, either in real life or her stories, her contempt of the inequities of the then class structure and gender disparities. Her work, ‘Mary Elizabeth’ depicts a homeless girl's choices between theft and begging as a means of survival. ‘One Way to Get An Education’ tells of a child laborer's desire for a better life than mill work offers and sees self-injuring as a way to a better education. Her work often depicted women succeeding in non-traditional careers such as physicians, ministers, and artists.

In 1884 came her well-regarded poetry collection ‘Songs of the Silent World’

Along with her husband she wrote two Biblical romances in 1890 and 1891. Her autobiography, ‘Chapters from a Life’ was serialized and then published in book form in 1896.

Phelps continued to write short stories and novels up to her death and over her life authored 57 volumes of fiction, poetry and essays.

Elizabeth Stuart Phelps died 28th January 1911, in Newton Center, Massachusetts. She was 66.

Index of Contents

AUTHORS NOTE

DRAMATIS PERSONÆ

WITHIN THE GATES

ACT I

SCENE I

SCENE II

SCENE III

SCENE IV

ACT II

SCENE I

SCENE II

SCENE III

ACT III

SCENE I

SCENE II

SCENE III

SCENE IV

ELIZABETH STUART PHELPS – A CONCISE BIBLIOGRAPHY

AUTHORS NOTE

This drama has so departed from the plan of the original story, The Gates Between, published by me long ago, that it is, in fact, a new work, and has therefore received a new title.—E. S. P. W.

DRAMATIS PERSONÆ

Doctor Esmerald Thorne, a city physician.

Helen Thorne, his wife.

Laddie, their child. [Between four and five years of age]

Mrs. Fayth, a patient of the Doctor’s, and a friend of Mrs. Thorne’s, an invalid.

Doctor Gazell, a hospital physician not in harmony with Dr. Thorne.

Dr. Carver, a young surgeon.

Maggie, a maid.

A Priest, Nurses, Patients, Servants, People in the Street, Spirits, the Angel Azrael.

WITHIN THE GATES

ACT I

SCENE I

A library in a city house. A dining-room opens beyond a portière. The dinner-table is set. The library is furnished in red leather and dark wood. Books run to the ceiling. The carpet is indeterminate in tone. The heavy curtains are of a rich, dark crimson. A window is to be seen. The library is littered a little with the signs of feminine occupation. At one of the tables sits MRS THORNE. She is a young and beautiful woman, of stately presence and modest, high-bred manner. She is well-dressed—but not over-dressed—in a tea-gown such as a lady might wear in her own home when guests are not expected. The dress is cream-white; it falls open over a crimson skirt. The lamps are shaded with lace of red or of white. One with a white shade is on the table by which she sits. Her sewing materials are lying about, among books and magazines half-cut. She tries to sew upon a little boy’s lace collar, but throws her work down restlessly. Her face wears a troubled expression.

[She rises and crosses the room nervously; goes to the window, and stands between the long lace curtains, looking out. She consults her watch; speaks.

MRS THORNE

It is not so very late! Hardly past six o’clock yet. What can be the matter with me? I must not become a worrier. A doctor’s wife can never afford to be that.

[Enter MAGGIE.

MAGGIE

Shall I serve dinner, ma’am?

MRS THORNE

The Doctor has not come, Maggie. We must wait—Jane will be careful not to burn the soup.

[Rises and looks again restlessly out of the window; calls:

Maggie!

MAGGIE

Ma’am?

MRS THORNE

When you went up to light the Doctor’s candles, how did Laddie seem? Did Molly say?

MAGGIE

Just the same, she said. He does seem sort of miser’ble.

[Exit MAGGIE.

MRS THORNE [Takes up a magazine and tries, in vain, to read; sighs, and lays it down; takes up the little lace collar and tries to sew; lays that down; rises]

I’ll run up again and look at