A Modern Instance by William Dean Howells

First published: 1882

Type of work: Novel

Type of plot: Domestic realism

Time of plot: Nineteenth century

Locale: New England

Principal characters

• Marcia Gaylord, a small-town young woman
• Squire Gaylord, her father
• Bartley Hubbard, her husband
• Atherton, a Boston lawyer
• Ben Halleck, a moral man
• Kinney, a vagabond

The Story:

In the little town of Equity, in northern New England, Bartley Hubbard is an up-and-coming young man. An orphan whose life has so far been one of great promise, he has a free and easy way about him and a ready tongue that makes him a general favorite. Squire Gaylord is pleased with his work as editor of the village paper, the Free Press, but not so pleased when Bartley becomes engaged to Marcia Gaylord, the squire’s only daughter.

One afternoon, Bartley and Marcia go for a sleigh ride. In a swamp, they meet another cutter that has overturned in deep snow while trying to pass them on the narrow trail. The women in the overturned vehicle are Mrs. Morrison and her daughter, Hannah, who work in the office of the Free Press. Bartley jumps out to help them. Mrs. Morrison gets into the cutter by herself. Bartley lifts Hannah Morrison to her place, however, and Marcia is angry enough to participate in their first quarrel.

Hannah is the daughter of the town drunkard. Young Bartley encourages her greatly, thinking to improve the quality of her work, but she interprets his interest as love. Her father calls on Bartley one morning, drunk as usual, and asks Bartley’s intentions toward his daughter. The young editor is so vexed and infuriated that he ejects Hannah’s father bodily. His foreman, Henry Bird, in his turn accuses Bartley of stealing Hannah’s affections. When he hits Bartley in the face, the latter retaliates with an openhanded slap. Henry falls, suffering a concussion when his head hits the floor.

The scandal is immense. Squire Gaylord takes a legal view of the possibility that Bird might die. Marcia interprets the fight as proof of an affair between Bartley and Hannah and breaks their engagement. Bartley resigns his job, even though Bird soon recovers. Bartley stays with Kinney, a crackerbox philosopher who cooks in a nearby logging camp. At the camp, Willett, the owner, visits with a fashionable party. Mrs. Macallister, one of the guests, flirts with Bartley, and he tries to curry favor by poking fun at the quaint Kinney. That same night, Bartley and Kinney part in anger, and the young man walks back to town.

After selling his horse and cutter, Bartley goes to the station to catch the Boston train. Marcia catches up with him at the depot. Asking his forgiveness, she begs him to take her back. They are married the same day and leave for Boston together. In the city, Bartley goes to work. He turns his visit to the logging camp into a feature article that he sells for twenty-five dollars, marking the start of his fairly comfortable, although uncertain, income as a freelance writer. Marcia and he can afford only one room, but they are happy together. Marcia’s father, Squire Gaylord, visits her once, to make certain she is married. He refuses to meet her husband again.

About the time Marcia learns that she is pregnant, Bartley is offered a job as managing editor of Events, whose publisher is a shrewd, unprincipled man named Witherby. With a regular salary at last, Bartley moves his wife into a private house. In college, Bartley had known Ben Halleck, a member of one of Boston’s older families. Marcia knows no one at all, and she often wonders why Bartley does not resume his acquaintance with the Hallecks. Now that Bartley has a better job, he does call on the Hallecks, and they at once befriend the Hubbards. Through them, the young couple also gets acquainted with Atherton, a conservative lawyer. Halleck cares no more for Bartley than he ever had, but he is sorry for the trusting Marcia, saddled with a shallow husband. After the birth of her child, Flavia, Marcia sees less and less of Bartley, who spends many of his evenings away from home.

Witherby offers to sell some stock in the newspaper. For this deal, Bartley borrows fifteen hundred dollars from Halleck. Before long, he has assumed a prosperous air, and his drinking adds greatly to his girth. One night, after a quarrel with Marcia, he stays out late and gets quite drunk. Halleck sees him on the street and rescues him from a police officer. When Halleck takes the drunken man back to Marcia, his pity for the poor wife increases.

Kinney, visiting the Hubbards, amuses Bartley and another newspaperman with stories of his picturesque life. After he leaves, Bartley writes up the tales and sells them to another paper without Kinney’s permission. Witherby is upset at seeing Bartley’s work in a rival newspaper, and when he learns that his managing editor had written the article in violation of ethical considerations, he dismisses Bartley.

Bartley returns to freelancing. Halleck is absent from the city; hence Bartley cannot repay him fifteen hundred dollars. He intends to do so, but he gambles with the money and before long loses several hundred dollars. Atherton and Halleck are confirmed in their suspicions of Bartley’s moral weakness. Marcia, returning from the Halleck house one evening, sees a drunken woman on the street. To her surprise, she recognizes Hannah Morrison. When she tries to talk with Hannah, the latter insists that Bartley is to blame for her present status in life. Suspecting and believing the worst of Bartley, Marcia rushes home and accuses him of having seduced Hannah. During the ensuing quarrel, they separate, and Bartley takes a train for Cleveland.

On the train, Bartley’s wallet is stolen; in consequence, he is unable to send money back to Halleck. In Boston, Marcia regrets her hasty conclusions and stays on at their house awaiting her husband’s return. When creditors begin to hound her, she enlists Atherton’s sympathetic aid. He and Halleck continue to look after the deserted wife. In time, she thinks of Bartley as dead, and Halleck wonders when he will be free to speak to her of his love.

By chance, a western newspaper comes into Halleck’s hands, a paper in which Bartley had given notice of suit for divorce. Marcia, her small daughter, Squire Gaylord, and Halleck take a train to Indiana to contest the suit. They arrive in time to have the divorce set aside, but during the trial, Marcia’s father has a stroke from which he never recovers. After the trial, Bartley drifts further west and becomes the editor of a weekly paper in Whited Sepulchre, Arizona. He is shot and killed there by a citizen of the town. When Bartley’s death is reported, Halleck wonders whether he is morally free to ask Marcia to marry him.

Bibliography

Cady, Edwin H. “The Chief American Realist: 1881-1885.” In The Road to Realism: The Early Years, 1837-1885, of William Dean Howells. Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse University Press, 1956. Places A Modern Instance in the broader context of Howells’s life and work while offering a general critical overview of the novel.

Goodman, Susan, and Carl Dawson. William Dean Howells: A Writer’s Life. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005. Broad and compelling biography providing a comprehensive account of Howells’s life and work. Among other topics, the biographers discuss Howells’s friendships with and support of contemporary writers and his significance in American letters. Includes illustrations and a bibliography.

Graydon, Ben. “Product Branding in Howells’s A Modern Instance.” ANQ 20, no. 2 (Spring, 2007): 35-39. Graydon discusses the product branding of Bartley’s beer in the novel, arguing that Howells’s critique of modern culture had economic, as well as social, dimensions.

Smith, Geoffrey D. “Bartley Hubbard and Behavioral Art in William Dean Howells’s A Modern Instance.” Studies in American Fiction 7 (1979): 83-91. Explores Howells’s literary techniques for depicting psychological processes in the novel.

Spangler, George M. “The Idea of Degeneration in American Fiction, 1880-1940.” English Studies 70, no. 5 (October, 1989): 407-435. Discusses A Modern Instance’s place in American literature and identifies the novel as beginning a reversal of the traditional theme of regeneration. According to Spangler, Bartley Hubbard’s degeneration paves the way for a new type of character, one that dominates much of the great fiction of succeeding years.

Stratman, Gregory J. Speaking for Howells: Charting the Dean’s Career Through the Language of His Characters. Lanham, Md.: University Press of America, 2001. Analyzes Howells’s interest in language, focusing on the language of his characters and his use of literary dialect. Stratman argues that Howells’s use of and writing about language demonstrates how his career moved in a circular path, from Romanticism to realism and back to Romanticism.

Tavernier-Courbin, Jacqueline. “Towards the City: Howells’ Characterization in A Modern Instance.” Modern Fiction Studies 24, no. 1 (Spring, 1978): 111-127. Examines the novel in the light of the conventions of nineteenth century popular fiction. According to Tavernier-Courbin, Howells uses setting and character in the novel to undermine typical romantic stereotypes.

Wright, Ellen F. “Given Bartley, Given Marcia: A Reconsideration of Howells’ A Modern Instance.” Texas Studies in Language and Literature 23, no. 2 (Summer, 1981): 214-231. By examining the many married couples in the novel, Wright argues that Howells does not intend to indict either American culture in general or the institution of marriage in particular.