author
Marian Gouverneur
A sharp-eyed memoirist of old New York and Washington society, she turned family memories and first-hand observation into a lively portrait of 19th-century American life. Her best-known book, As I Remember, is prized for its intimate glimpses of the people, manners, and social world of her era.
1 Audiobook
As I Remember Recollections of American Society during the Nineteenth Century
by Marian Gouverneur
About the author
Born Marian Campbell in 1821, she was an American writer and social figure whose recollections drew on a long life spent close to prominent families and public life. In her memoir she remembers growing up on Long Island, later living in New York and Washington, and moving through the social circles that shaped much of 19th-century American society.
Her best-known work, As I Remember: Recollections of American Society during the Nineteenth Century, was published in 1911. Written late in life at her family's urging, the book blends personal memory with sketches of customs, education, travel, and notable personalities, giving readers a warm, detailed sense of a world already fading when she wrote.
She died in 1914. Today, she is remembered less as a novelist than as a vivid memoirist whose writing preserves the texture of everyday elite life in the United States across a remarkable span of years.