Susan Petigru King wrote and published virtually all of her novels and short stories just before and during the American civil war, although her fiction deals neither with slavery nor sectional politics. Set in her native Charleston and its surrounding plantations, King's novels explore the social life and sexual politics of South Carolina's privileged antebellum elite. In the tradition of nineteenth-century domestic novels, King's writings chronicle courtships and marriages, love and jealousy. The republication of these long-neglected novels will introduce contemporary readers to the imaginative power of an important southern American woman writer.
Lily, King's best known novel, was originally published by Harper and Brothers in 1855. In this work, King skewers the rituals of courtship that propel its wealthy young heroine toward marriage and a melodramatic death. Gerald Gray's Wife, King's last novel, plays out the ironies of a plain woman who survives—but barely—the revelations that destroy her seemingly perfect marriage and acquired beauty. In both novels, women's jealousies and men's deceptions are the forces that propel King's often satirical pen. Largely lacking the moral instruction so common among nineteenth-century domestic novelists, King's novels are differentiated by their critical perspective on women's position, their exploration of themes of failure and frustration, and their focus on the drawing room and ballroom rather than the kitchen and nursery.

The lily is a flower of contradictions. It represents both life and death, appearing at weddings and funerals. In their pure white form, lilies are a symbol of innocence, chastity, and purity of heart, but in contrast, the highly fragrant and intensely colored orange lilies symbolize passion. In Lily, Marcia Reiss explores these paradoxes, tracing the flower’s cultural significance in art, literature, religion, and popular entertainment throughout history.

 

Reiss journeys from the tomb carvings of ancient Egypt to the paintings of Claude Monet, Georgia O’Keeffe, and Salvador Dalí, exploring the lily as a subject of fascination and obsession. Unearthing many absorbing facts and fables about the blossom, she examines its use in cuisine and reveals them to have been a source of food and medicine in China for centuries. While Reiss focuses her attention on true lilies and the ornamental hybrids breeders have derived from them, she also provides extensive information about a wide variety of popular lilies, including daylilies, lilies of the valley, water lilies, and calla lilies. Filled with striking illustrations of these gorgeous plants, Lily is a book for gardeners and lily admirers alike.