Imaging American Women: Idea and Ideals in Cultural History by Martha Banta; Columbia University Press, 1987

There was a long tradition of serious stage actresses who played male roles taken from the classical and Shakespearean repertoire.

In 1900 two of America's favorite stage stars were Maude Adams and Julia Marlowe. They were women praised for their winsome femininity, but they also achieved renown on Broadway in the roles of doomed young men. Maude Adams, who portrayed Edmond Rostand's hero L'Aiglon, was, of course, the same actress who originated the role of Peter Pan, the boy who never grows up into sexual or emotional maturity.

Maude Adams was a great success on the stage playing romantic ingènues or the perennially boyish Peter Pan whose best "pal" is Tinker Bell and whose "love" is Wendy -- a name he cannot remember once she leaves his side. In the theater world Maude Adams' status as the Type of the Ideal extended her appeal...

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