A contemporary of Emerson, Hawthorne, the Alcotts, and other New England Renaissance figures, Sarah Alden Bradford Ripley (1793-1867) is largely unknown to today's readers. Although she left no published works, Sarah is frequently mentioned in letters and journals written by her fellow intellectuals.

She was a self-educated classical scholar who was well versed in languages and the sciences, ran a boarding school with her Unitarian minister husband to prepare boys for Harvard College, and raised seven children.

In this first biography of the remarkable Mrs. Ripley, Joan W. Goodwin draws on both Sarah's letters and the writings of her contemporaries to paint as full a picture as possible of a compelling figure known until now only as a literary footnote. Goodwin reveals the inner drama of a woman's lonely struggle to reconcile the liberal Christian worldview with her own increasing skepticism, and her traditional domestic role with the pursuit of intellectual attainments.