ABSTRACT
The epic genre's unfriendliness to both women writers and women characters is a widely held assumption in the critical community. The female epic character with the most resonance through the tradition, however, is assuredly Homer's Penelope. American verse epics that feature women prominently create their heroines broadly speaking in the mold of Homer's Penelope: intelligent, able, and compassionate. The American pioneer women in particular exhibit the kind of heroic virtue of the Greek paradigm, one that has drawn the attention of women authors recovered in this chapter. The chapter illustrates the three pieces, Snow Covered Wagons by Julia Cooley Altrocchi, Pocahontas by Nathalia Crane, and An Epic Poem on the Rise of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints by Hannah Tapfield King, that represent a variety of women's voices in the epic genre.
