Elizabeth Bdisland's Race Around The World Summary

Review Essay Matthew Goodman’s essay “Elizabeth Bisland’s Race Around the World” is a sweet, adventurous read that takes you on a journey, but not necessarily the one that the reader expects. Goodman sets up this paper as if it will be about her actual race against Nellie Bly, and he does explain what the race was. However, he somewhat switches halfway through and it turns more into a paper solely about Bislands life, which is not exactly a bad thing. The paper feels more complete even, with the extra information and insight into who Bisland was as a person.
It starts with a publisher, John Brisben Walker, reading about Bly’s plans to travel around the world in seventy-five days, faster than anyone had even imagined. Walker works for a monthly magazine The Cosmopolitan, and decides that they should sponsor somebody to also try their hand at this feat, racing Bly. The person they chose was Elizabeth Bisland. Towards the end of the paper, it turns more into a story about who Bisland was as a person, and everything else she accomplished in her life. Such as, marrying an attorney, Charles Wetmore, and building a house with him on Long Island.
The connotation used holds Elizabeth Bisland on a huge pedestal that she neither deserved nor wanted. However, the intrigue Goodman has for Bislands life is what made this worth reading. Goodman describes Bisland as “tall, with an elegant, almost imperious bearing that made her appear even taller; she had large dark eyes and luminous pale skin and spoke in a low, gentle voice” This evangelical zeal about her look and personality almost overshadows what she actually did in her