Clarence and Corinne; Or, God's Way

Published in 1890, Clarence and Corinne is a novel that reflects the social reform ideology of the U.S. women's movement in the late 19th century. Mrs. Johnson condemns the destructive effects of demon alcohol on the nuclear family, focusing on the danger that alcoholism poses to women and children. When it first appeared, Clarence and Corinne was cited by the Baptist Messenger, a black religious publication, as one of the silent, yet powerful agents at work to break down unreasonable prejudice, which is a hindrance to both races.

This book is one of the foundations upon which multicultural children's literature has evolved.--Daphne Muse, Menut College

Spillars points out in her introduction that as a 'didactic narrative of the family, ' the book fits into the reform programs of the late nineteenth-century women's movement. In a text punctuated with Bible passages and moral aphorisms, the narrative chronicles the gradual process by which alcohol disrupts and destroys the Burton family and makes orphans of the two protagonists. While admits that the novel does not satisfy post-modernist reader expectations for ambiguity and textual complexity, she believes its final exhortation for a new social order is one that readers will find surprisingly contemporary.--The Women's Review of Books