Anna Cora Mowatt was the author of the first Broadway comedy hit written by a woman. Her 1845 play ÒFashionÓ is still performed today. She was also the first woman to professionally perform solo public readings of literature in the U.S. In pre-Civil War America, she was a popular novelist, poet, playwright, essayist, and correspondent. Autobiography of an Actress tells the dramatic story of her life and her struggles to overcome the anti-theatrical prejudices of her day.