“Being Strangely Unwomanly”

Dime novels, mass-market literature of the second half of the nineteenth century, provide a unique perspective on the values and concepts accessible to the mainstream, as opposed to elite, culture. Because these consumable novels are not a part of the enduring literary canon, research has largely ignored these diverse expressions, which include a wide array of stories about gender-diverse and transgender presentations. This article explores some of the most explicit transgender moments and motives in dime novels, including stories showcasing gender disguise, gender expression outside cultural permissibility, explicit statements of homoerotic expression and transgender behavior, and encoded behaviors demonstrating the far reaches of gender-tied attributes. While other research has explored the transgender overtures of dime heroes pulled from the real world like Calamity Jane and Go-Won-Go Mohawk, this article focuses on the narrative utility of fictional characters’ gender transgressions. These characters engage in gender play without a specific need beyond authorial or readerly desire to explore and express transgender imagery. Dime novel stories, as the major popular literature of the nineteenth century, provide a lens for transgender and gender-diverse people and narratives that have been too long unexamined in trans* and queer theoretical contexts, especially illuminating the mainstream experience of these populations.