within big-picture Civil War history, they disregard vital facts surrounding wealthy women’s lives and treat them as trivial matters. In doing so, historians lose the true essence of who these women were in their emotional and social worlds, thus making her sole purpose in life to ‘live only for war’ (21). In Stowe’s second chapter, Keeping the Diary, shifts the focus from analyzing diaries to the women who wrote them and their motives for taking up the pen. The chapters entitled Wartime, Men, and Slaves represent dominant themes present in many of the 20 women’s diaries. In choosing to focus on these specific aspects, Stowe illuminates the most intense moments of southern women’s lives when the trauma of war altered their domestic worlds forever. Finally, Herself concludes Stowe’s monograph with an examination of how the diarist saw herself during the Civil War. Lucy Buck retreated to her pages to record valuable lessons learned: ‘My nerves are growing stronger and I am, I hope wiser now,’ while Anna Green reported the opposite: ‘I am growing older, without growing wiser or happier or better’ (150–51). These self-reflections place women at the center of analysis, exposing her raw emotions while the war remains at the periphery. Though Stowe’s innovative approach to reclaim the humanity of planter-class women is commendable, Keep the Days is not free from imperfections. At times, Stowe walks a fine line between sympathy and empathy, often confusing the two. In the chapter entitled Slaves, for instance, Stowe asserts that it is easy to villainize slave-owning women for their crimes against humanity. Stowe wishes to read their diaries in such a way that his condemnation of slavery does not ‘turn their world into a place where no one could have lived’ (103). However, his writing suggests he is more sympathetic to the plight of white wealthy Confederate women instead of remaining unbiased and objective. In an almost apologetic manner, Stowe ignores the brutality of the slave institution and disregards the fact that human bondage sustained the wealth and privilege of these women. Overall, Stowe examines his primary source sample analytically and with remarkable sensitivity. By urging scholars to interpret women’s diaries in a more nuanced fashion, Stowe adds depth into the seemingly trivial lives of upper-class Confederate women. Keep the Days remains an essential and compelling read for scholars interested in the Civil War era and nineteenth-century gender studies of the American South.

中文翻译：

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战前美国南部的黑人诉讼当事人

在大范围的内战历史中，他们无视富裕女性生活的重要事实，并将其视为微不足道的事情。这样做，历史学家失去了这些女性在情感和社会世界中的真实本质，从而使她的人生唯一目标是“只为战争而活”（21）。在斯托的第二章，保持日记，将重点从分析日记转移到写日记的女性和她们拿起笔的动机。题为战时、男人和奴隶的章节代表了 20 篇女性日记中的许多篇章中的主要主题。在选择关注这些特定方面时，斯托阐明了南方女性生活中最紧张的时刻，当时战争的创伤永远改变了她们的家庭世界。最后，她本人在斯托的专着中总结了这位日记作者在内战期间如何看待自己。露西·巴克回到她的书页，记录了宝贵的经验教训：“我的神经越来越强壮，我希望现在更聪明了，”而安娜·格林则相反：“我正在变老，但没有变得更聪明、更快乐或更好”（ 150-51）。这些自我反省将女性置于分析的中心，在战争仍处于边缘时暴露了她的原始情感。尽管 Stowe 重新唤起种植者级女性人性的创新方法值得称赞，但 Keep the Days 并非没有缺陷。有时，斯托在同情和同理心之间徘徊，经常混淆两者。例如，在题为“奴隶”的一章中，斯托断言很容易将拥有奴隶的妇女因其危害人类的罪行而受到谴责。斯托希望以这样一种方式阅读他们的日记，即他对奴隶制的谴责不会“将他们的世界变成一个没有人可以生活的地方”（103）。然而，他的文章表明，他更同情南方富有的白人女性的困境，而不是保持公正和客观。斯托以一种近乎道歉的方式无视奴隶制度的残酷性，无视人类奴役维持了这些妇女的财富和特权这一事实。总的来说，斯托以分析的方式检查了他的主要来源样本，并具有非凡的灵敏度。通过敦促学者以更细致入微的方式解释女性日记，斯托为上流社会的邦联女性看似微不足道的生活增添了深度。