Opening in London, approximately one year on from the conclusion of Isabel Carleton's Year, this second of five books devoted to the adventures of the eponymous heroine is divided into two sections. The first chronicles Isabel's experiences in England with her Cousin Eunice (Mrs. Everard), the widowed relative who took her off on a European tour to help her get over the trauma of her best friend's death in a boating accident. Isabel's experiences at the pension in London - the German servant who forms an attachment to her, her friendship with the biracial (Franco-Indian) Doret family - and her trip into Kent to stay with a friend of her cousin's, all play out against the backdrop of the beginnings of World War I. When Isabel and Mrs. Everard are able to get passage home, they leave for America, accompanied by Herbert Barry, a countryman (and fellow Jeffersonian) they met on their travels. The second section of the book concerns Isabel's experiences back in America - her return to her home in Jefferson (based upon Madison, WI), her joyful reunion with her loving family, and her first semester at the State University where her father is a professor. The central dilemma facing her here is the changing nature of her relationship with longtime friend, Rodney Fox, and her move from girlhood into young womanhood...

Much like its predecessor, I greatly enjoyed The Heart of Isabel Carleton, which presented a fascinating mixture of outdated and surprisingly contemporary themes and ideas. Margaret Ashmun writes well - her descriptions are beautiful, her storytelling engrossing, her characters well-realized and sensitively depicted. I found Isabel a flawed but sympathetic heroine, and her enthusiasm and sincerity struck me as very American, in the best possible way. The scene in which she watches New York City draw near, thinking of it as a kind of 'New Jerusalem' toward which pilgrims were drawn, was very moving to me. So too were her reflections on America in general, a country that was, for all its faults, a "refuge, protector, mother, and creator of races; shrine of sacred purposes, conserver of liberty in a world of oppression; dispenser of the unsullied gifts of freedom and democracy." I suspect that many contemporary readers would wince at such passages, objecting to them as untrue, or perhaps even propagandistic, but for me they were a poignant reminder of the sense of purpose and pride that we Americans seem to have lost, as a nation. Paradoxically, without that sense of pride, without a belief in our own essential goodness as a people, I suspect we will remain unable to fulfill the full potential of our founding ideals. We need that belief now more than ever, to counter the political violence and cultural and historical vandalism that is becoming ever more prevalent around us.

I find that reading older children's books can open a window into earlier times and world-views, and this has certainly been the case here, not just in the author's approach to national self image, but also in her handling of the issues of racial and cultural diversity. As a character, Isabel is sometimes a little snobby, but is also frequently determined to be democratic. She feels she should befriend and be kind to all manner of people - in London, for instance, she and Cousin Eunice are the only ones to reach out to the biracial Doret family - but she still tends to stereotype people of other races and cultures, and it is questionable whether she considers them equals. Nowhere is this contradiction better exemplified than in the passage devoted to the various types of people found on the campus of a state university. The narrative describes the dizzying array of figures that make up the university community, and concludes that this diversity is one of the prime benefits of attending such an institution. In addition to the different types of student and instructor (country youths, athletic girls, older women studying for higher degrees, young professors wanting to appear solemn, etc.), specific mention is made of Chinese, Indian ("Hindoo"), Japanese, Filipino, Black ("negro"), and Russian Jewish students. Isabel herself declares, following this paragraph-long list, that "it's a great thing for me to come into contact with so many different kinds of people. I want to have the widest kind of human sympathy." This sounds quite progressive, until one considers the language used in describing some of these groups, from the "round-faced, yellow-skinned Chinamen" to the "eager Russian Jews, thirsting for knowledge and redolent of Socialism." Clearly, the sympathy that Isabel wants to cultivate only goes so far, in Ashmun's conception of it.

The Heart of Isabel Carleton was published in 1917, and set in 1914. Some of its content is quite dated by contemporary standards, and can be uncomfortable to read. On the other hand, some of it is quite progressive for its time, particularly in the world of vintage girls' fiction, which tended to be rather reactionary. One need only compare Ashmun's sympathetic treatment of the mixed-raced Doret children to the hysterical horror evinced by the characters in Jean K. Baird's Hester trilogy (1909-12), at the idea of the heroine possibly having some African ancestry, to see that this is so. For my own part, I think Ashmun had some good ideals - promoting a more democratic social sensibility, and the idea that knowing all different kinds of people makes us better human beings - but she didn't manage to transcend the prejudices of her time and place. I look at her work, and think how far we've come, and am grateful for the lesson. Recommended to anyone who has read and enjoyed Isabel Carleton's Year. ( )