The feminine political novel in Victorian England

Bibliographic Information

The feminine political novel in Victorian England

Barbara Leah Harman

(Victorian literature and culture series)

University Press of Virginia, 1998

  • : cloth
  • : [pbk.]

Available at  / 30 libraries

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Note

Bibliography: p. [207]-215

Includes index

Description and Table of Contents

Volume

: cloth ISBN 9780813917726

Description

The author seeks to establishe a new category in Victorian fiction with this book: the feminine political novel. By studying Victorian female protagonists who particiate in the public universe conventionally occupied by men - the world of mills and city streets, of political activism and labour strikes, of public speaking and parliamentary debates. she reassesses the public realm as the site of noble and meaningful action for women in Victorian England. Harman examines at length Bronte's ""Shirley"", Gaskell's ""North and South"", Meredith's ""Diana of the Crossways"", Gissing's ""In the Year of Jubilee"" and Elizabeth Robins's ""The Convert"", reading these novels in relation to each other and to developments in the emerging British women's movement. She argues that these texts constitute a counter-tradition in Victorian fiction: neither domestic fiction for fiction about the public ""fallen"" woman, these novels reveal how 19th-century English writers began to think about female transgression into the political sphere and about the intriguing meanings of women's public appearances. The author draws on significant historical research, including materials related to female higher education, the law of ""coverture"" (under which a woman's legal identity was incorporated into that of her husband"", the suffrage movement, and well-known prose works of the period such as Sarah Lewis's ""Woman's Mission"" and Mill's ""Subjection of Women"".
Volume

: [pbk.] ISBN 9780813929361

Description

In this groundbreaking book, Barbara Leah Harman convincingly establishes a new category in Victorian fiction: the feminine political novel. By studying Victorian female protagonists who participate in the public universe conventionally occupied by men, she is able to reassess the public realm as the site of noble and meaningful action for women in Victorian England.

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