• 미국학
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• 제43권1호
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• pp.83-97
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• 2020

"Behind a Mask" (1866) marks the new direction of Louisa May Alcott's artistic and personal life. Her European trip solidified her identity as a mature woman, most importantly as a mature American woman, one whose independence from Victorian stereotypes would, from now on, make her fortune and fame. Her sensational stories, especially "Behind a Mask," would tell truths that readers recognized but had rarely seen written. These truths would free them, and the author herself, to explore their talents as individuals. Henceforth, Alcott would embody the successful American artistic entrepreneur as one who shed the European domination of false titles and inherited wealth. These motifs of the transnational connection pervade the story, in the form of images and likenesses. Just as Alcott would soon, in two years, reach astonishing financial success with the publication of Little Women, her meteoric ascent parallels America's rise to power in the world's economy, which came about with almost alarming speed after the conclusion of the American Civil War.