Mary Baker Eddy/Bibliography

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Biographies

• 1998: Mary Baker Eddy by Gillian Gill. Perseus Books. ISBN 0-7382-0042-5. 713 pages.
  • I am a big fan of the Gill biography. It's author was, after some patient waiting, granted access to archives closely held by the First Church of Christ, Scientist in Boston. This now out-of-print, 713-page tome (150+ pages of which are notes, references and appendices) is one of the more clear-eyed examinations of Mary Baker Eddy's life, and contains much useful material about the condition and expectations for women in the latter part of nineteenth-century America. Taking essentially no stand on whether or not Mary Baker Eddy possessed a special healing ability, and making no judgements about her religion, the book examines Mary Baker Eddy as a person, a woman, and later a public figure. It's one of those books where you'll find yourself spending as much time reading the footnotes as the text itself.Pat Palmer (talk) 18:14, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

• 1909: The Life of Mary Baker Eddy and the History of Christian Science by Georgine Milmine (disputed). ISBN 978-1313288934. 564 pages. Paperback, reprinted Jan. 28, 2013 by Hardpress Publishing.
  • This book was created by aggregating a series of exposé articles published 1907 to 1909 in McClure's Magazine. According to Gillian Gill's extensive investigation of the Milmine work as background for her own 1998 biography, not only is Milmine's authorship in question, but the background sources for the articles were dominated by people who had brought lawsuits against Mrs. Eddy or had previously fallen out with her, and the true authorship of the series more likely belongs with some of McClure's well known staff (which included the now famous Willa Cather). It now appears that the avowed author of the book probably wrote little of the book which bears her name. Milmine's authorship was not challenged in print until as late as 1993, when a letter was found implicating Willa Cather as author of parts 2-14 of the series. Cather appears not to have wanted any public association with the book, and the terms of Cather's will prevent a key letter about the matter from being published (although Gill paraphrases its contents). Ms. Gill notes the extraordinary influence of this early biography on subsequent biographies (such as Powell 1907; Dakin 1929; and Bates/Dittemore 1932), despite its own source materials being lost and despite the complex mystery surrounding its authorship and the intentions and objectivity of its authors. The promotion of this book touts it as being free from influence from the Church of Christ, Scientist (not for lack of trying), so it was, perhaps unfortunately, for a time to be considered the single trustworthy source of information on, especially, the first half of Mrs. Eddy's life.
    • I have now read most of this biography. While some of it is neutral, or even complimentary, other parts are extremely scathing in tone. And the author was clearly targeting a female audience. I recall laughing out loud at several figures of speech taken from the realms of knitting and sewing.Pat Palmer (talk) 20:10, 18 August 2020 (UTC)