Mistress of the House: Women of Property in the Victorian NovelThis exploration of gender and property ownership in eight important novels argues that property is a decisive undercurrent in narrative structures and modes, as well as an important gender signature in society and culture. Tim Dolin suggests that the formal development of nineteenth-century domestic fiction can only be understood in the context of changes in the theory and laws of property: indeed femininity and its representation cannot be considered separately from property relations and their reform. He presents original readings of novels in which a woman owns, acquires or loses property, focusing on exchanges between patriarchal cultural authority, the 'woman question' and narrative form, and on the place of domestic fiction in a culture in which property relations and gender relations are subject to radical review. Each chapter revolves around a representative text, but refers substantially to other material, both other novels and contemporary social, legal, political and feminist commentary. |
From inside the book
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... Hardy's uncovered women 6 Mistress of herself: Diana of the Crossways Appendix 1 Barbara Bodichon: A brief summary of the laws concerning women (1854) Appendix 2 The Caroline Norton affair Bibliography Index The Nineteenth Century ...
... Hardy's uncovered women 6 Mistress of herself: Diana of the Crossways Appendix 1 Barbara Bodichon: A brief summary of the laws concerning women (1854) Appendix 2 The Caroline Norton affair Bibliography Index The Nineteenth Century ...
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... Hardy's Far from the Madding Crowd ( 1874 ) and The Woodlanders ( 1887 ) . The reform of the property laws affecting married women was the most fundamental of all feminist legal and social reforms in the nineteenth century . Neither the ...
... Hardy's Far from the Madding Crowd ( 1874 ) and The Woodlanders ( 1887 ) . The reform of the property laws affecting married women was the most fundamental of all feminist legal and social reforms in the nineteenth century . Neither the ...
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... increasingly associated with coquetry (especially in Shirley and the novels of Hardy). The woman's property, that is to say, increases her value, and as Georg Simmel argues, 'we call those objects valuable that resist.
... increasingly associated with coquetry (especially in Shirley and the novels of Hardy). The woman's property, that is to say, increases her value, and as Georg Simmel argues, 'we call those objects valuable that resist.
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... Hardy's property - owning heroines are also typically undisciplined , and victims of impulse . Like Diana , they are troubled by , and often trapped by , femininity . For Hardy , who was clearly fascinated by the idea of the financially ...
... Hardy's property - owning heroines are also typically undisciplined , and victims of impulse . Like Diana , they are troubled by , and often trapped by , femininity . For Hardy , who was clearly fascinated by the idea of the financially ...
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... Hardy's much earlier treatments of the propertied heroine. Many other examples of Victorian novels which include propertied women may be noted: among the most obvious would be Dickens's Little Dorrit and Great Expectations, George ...
... Hardy's much earlier treatments of the propertied heroine. Many other examples of Victorian novels which include propertied women may be noted: among the most obvious would be Dickens's Little Dorrit and Great Expectations, George ...
Contents
Shirley | |
Cranford and its belongings | |
Villette | |
The Moonstone | |
Hardys uncovered women | |
Diana of the Crossways | |
A brief summary of the laws | |
The Caroline Norton affair | |
Index | |
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Common terms and phrases
argues Barbara Bodichon becomes Betteredge Bretton Brontė Caroline Celt chapter character Charlotte Brontė Collins comedy comic conflict conventional coverture Cranford Cranfordians critical Crossways culture debates Diana divorce domestic earnings England English female feminine feminist figure Gaskell Gaskell's gender Gillian Beer Hardy Hardy's Helsinger Helstone heroine heroine's Hintock household husband ideology imagination independent Irish Jane Eyre Jude Jude the Obscure Jude's ladies landed landscape language live London Lucy Lucy's marriage married women's property Mary Meredith middle-class mistress Moonstone moral narrative narrator nature passion plot political possession property laws property reform provincial question Rachel readers realism Redworth relations relationship representation represents resistance rhetoric romance scene sensation novel sensationalism sexual Shirley Shirley's social social realism society space sphere story struggle suggests things Verinder Victorian fiction Victorian novel Villette voice Wessex widow wife wives woman of property women Woodlanders writing