From Mining Ore to Uncovering Gilt: Cecelia Tichi’s Gilded Age Novels

Abstract

Mark Twain could not have anticipated the longevity of the term “the gilded age” when he coined it in his 1873 novel, The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today. Neither he nor his coauthor, Charles Dudley Warner, could have predicted that their satire of a family’s attempt to sell 75,000 acres of land in Tennessee to speculators in Washington, D.C. would result in the naming of an entire period between the 1870s and 1900 or in the calling out of the materialism and corruption of industrialists and politicians. The novel did engage romance along with social satire and political criticism in its caricatures of individuals engaged in land speculation and various schemes to get rich; however, it did not address the “captains of industry” and “robber barons,” as the wealthy Andrew Carnegie, J. P. Morgan, John D. Rockefeller, Leland Stanford, and Cornelius Vanderbilt came to be called for their transformation of steel, banking, oil, railroads, and shipping into formidable industrial and corporate powers. Reform-minded individuals, however, voiced their opposition to the unmistakable greed apparent in corporate growth and industrial expansion at the expense of workers and weaker competitors. Progressives called attention to corruption and graft in urban political arenas and to health and sanitation hazards in home and work environments that were not isolated incidents, but rather recurring news events vying with personal scandals for headlines in tabloids, scandal sheets, and dailies. Yet, here we are today well into the twenty-first century and Mark Twain’s labeling has never been more popular with readers and media-savvy audiences. The television costume drama, Gilded Age on HBO, has carried the name of the era into more homes with viewers eager to watch the ensconced wealthy characters and social climbing newcomers make their way through New York social spaces and navigate the mores of a challenging landscape. Women are central to this visual dramatization of the age. This showcasing of issues affecting women and gender roles may perhaps be a subliminal residue from Mark Twain’s narrative contribution in The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today and his creation of the central figure, Laura, an adopted daughter of