Max Saunders
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- May 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199579761
- eISBN:
- 9780191722882
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199579761.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 19th-century Literature and Romanticism, 20th-century Literature and Modernism
This book explores how writers from the 1870s to the 1930s experimented with forms of life‐writing — biography, autobiography, memoir, diary, journal — increasingly for the purposes of fiction. It ...
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This book explores how writers from the 1870s to the 1930s experimented with forms of life‐writing — biography, autobiography, memoir, diary, journal — increasingly for the purposes of fiction. It argues for an upsurge in new hybrid forms — identified in a surprisingly early essay of 1906 (which provides a key term) as ‘autobiografiction’. Examples include ‘Mark Rutherford’, Gissing, Samuel Butler, Gosse, and A. C. Benson. The book offers a taxonomy of their extraordinary variety, showing how they arose as the pressures of secularization and psychological theory disturbed the categories of biography and autobiography. It argues that a group of concepts, forms, and tropes regularly co‐exist: portraiture, imaginary portraits, collections of such portraits; and (because they are often of imaginary artists) imaginary works of art and literature. Autobiografiction also sheds strong light on modernism. Modernism is often characterized as a movement of ‘impersonality' — a rejection of auto/biography — but most of its major works engage in profound ways with questions of life‐writing. The second part looks at writers experimenting further with autobiografiction as impressionism turns into modernism, and consists of detailed readings of Joyce, Stein, Pound, Woolf, and others, and juxtaposing their work with contemporaries whose experiments with life‐writing forms are no less striking. It argues that connecting modernist games with auto/biography and the ‘New Biography’ with their turn‐of‐the‐century precursors allows them to be understood in a new way. A coda considers the after‐life of these experiments in postmodern fiction. A conclusion considers the theoretical implications developed throughout, and argues that ‘autobiografiction’ can also shed light on under‐theorized questions such as what we mean by ‘autobiographical’ and the relations between autobiography and fiction.Less
This book explores how writers from the 1870s to the 1930s experimented with forms of life‐writing — biography, autobiography, memoir, diary, journal — increasingly for the purposes of fiction. It argues for an upsurge in new hybrid forms — identified in a surprisingly early essay of 1906 (which provides a key term) as ‘autobiografiction’. Examples include ‘Mark Rutherford’, Gissing, Samuel Butler, Gosse, and A. C. Benson. The book offers a taxonomy of their extraordinary variety, showing how they arose as the pressures of secularization and psychological theory disturbed the categories of biography and autobiography. It argues that a group of concepts, forms, and tropes regularly co‐exist: portraiture, imaginary portraits, collections of such portraits; and (because they are often of imaginary artists) imaginary works of art and literature. Autobiografiction also sheds strong light on modernism. Modernism is often characterized as a movement of ‘impersonality' — a rejection of auto/biography — but most of its major works engage in profound ways with questions of life‐writing. The second part looks at writers experimenting further with autobiografiction as impressionism turns into modernism, and consists of detailed readings of Joyce, Stein, Pound, Woolf, and others, and juxtaposing their work with contemporaries whose experiments with life‐writing forms are no less striking. It argues that connecting modernist games with auto/biography and the ‘New Biography’ with their turn‐of‐the‐century precursors allows them to be understood in a new way. A coda considers the after‐life of these experiments in postmodern fiction. A conclusion considers the theoretical implications developed throughout, and argues that ‘autobiografiction’ can also shed light on under‐theorized questions such as what we mean by ‘autobiographical’ and the relations between autobiography and fiction.
Josephine M. Guy
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- September 2018
- ISBN:
- 9781474408912
- eISBN:
- 9781474445030
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474408912.003.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 19th-century and Victorian Literature
This chapter provides an overview of critical histories of the fin de siècle outlining some of the key concepts associated with defining this period in literary history. It explores the relationship ...
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This chapter provides an overview of critical histories of the fin de siècle outlining some of the key concepts associated with defining this period in literary history. It explores the relationship between global, national and regional understandings of the fin de siècle, and poses questions about the utility of the term ‘fin de siècle’ as marking out a distinct period in literary history. The Introduction also provides brief summaries of each of the following chapters in the volume.Less
This chapter provides an overview of critical histories of the fin de siècle outlining some of the key concepts associated with defining this period in literary history. It explores the relationship between global, national and regional understandings of the fin de siècle, and poses questions about the utility of the term ‘fin de siècle’ as marking out a distinct period in literary history. The Introduction also provides brief summaries of each of the following chapters in the volume.
SARAH BILSTON
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199272617
- eISBN:
- 9780191709685
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199272617.003.0006
- Subject:
- Literature, 19th-century and Victorian Literature
This chapter examines the intersections between romance and New Woman fictions on the question of sexual knowledge. It shows that New Woman author and the romance writer may both now be resituated ...
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This chapter examines the intersections between romance and New Woman fictions on the question of sexual knowledge. It shows that New Woman author and the romance writer may both now be resituated within a broader Victorian female tradition, a vibrant literary community, a strong history of dialogue and debate. It demonstrates that the New Woman herself stands revealed as daughter to a host of rebellious, transitional heroines from the literature of the later nineteenth century.Less
This chapter examines the intersections between romance and New Woman fictions on the question of sexual knowledge. It shows that New Woman author and the romance writer may both now be resituated within a broader Victorian female tradition, a vibrant literary community, a strong history of dialogue and debate. It demonstrates that the New Woman herself stands revealed as daughter to a host of rebellious, transitional heroines from the literature of the later nineteenth century.
Steven Huebner
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- May 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780195189544
- eISBN:
- 9780199868476
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195189544.003.0002
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
This chapter focuses on Jules Massenet's rise to pre-eminence in French operatic culture. It cites the role of his teacher, Ambroise Thomas, who assumed a position of great influence by his ...
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This chapter focuses on Jules Massenet's rise to pre-eminence in French operatic culture. It cites the role of his teacher, Ambroise Thomas, who assumed a position of great influence by his appointment as director of the Conservatoire in 1871. It argues that in addition to obvious musical craft and facility, sheer industry also carried Massenet a long way. Massenet's various works are considered.Less
This chapter focuses on Jules Massenet's rise to pre-eminence in French operatic culture. It cites the role of his teacher, Ambroise Thomas, who assumed a position of great influence by his appointment as director of the Conservatoire in 1871. It argues that in addition to obvious musical craft and facility, sheer industry also carried Massenet a long way. Massenet's various works are considered.
Max Saunders
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- May 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199579761
- eISBN:
- 9780191722882
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199579761.003.0004
- Subject:
- Literature, 19th-century Literature and Romanticism, 20th-century Literature and Modernism
This is the first of four chapters exploring the turn‐of‐the‐century disturbances in the relation between life‐writing and fiction. It argues that ‘autobiography’ begins to seem a problematic ...
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This is the first of four chapters exploring the turn‐of‐the‐century disturbances in the relation between life‐writing and fiction. It argues that ‘autobiography’ begins to seem a problematic category in the period, and gets displaced towards fiction. The chapter focuses on ‘Mark Rutherford’, not just for his autobiography, but for his later inclusion of the story ‘A Mysterious Portrait’. The concept of the heteronym is introduced, to be developed in Chapters 7 and Chapter 8. Other authors discussed here include George Gissing (The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft), H. G. Wells (Boon), Henry Adams, Samuel Butler (The Way of All Flesh), and Edmund Gosse (Father and Son). The various displacements of auto/biography are shown to complicate Lejeune's concept of the autobiographic contract guaranteeing the identity of author, narrator, and subject.Less
This is the first of four chapters exploring the turn‐of‐the‐century disturbances in the relation between life‐writing and fiction. It argues that ‘autobiography’ begins to seem a problematic category in the period, and gets displaced towards fiction. The chapter focuses on ‘Mark Rutherford’, not just for his autobiography, but for his later inclusion of the story ‘A Mysterious Portrait’. The concept of the heteronym is introduced, to be developed in Chapters 7 and Chapter 8. Other authors discussed here include George Gissing (The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft), H. G. Wells (Boon), Henry Adams, Samuel Butler (The Way of All Flesh), and Edmund Gosse (Father and Son). The various displacements of auto/biography are shown to complicate Lejeune's concept of the autobiographic contract guaranteeing the identity of author, narrator, and subject.
Tim Youngs
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- May 2014
- ISBN:
- 9781846319587
- eISBN:
- 9781781380895
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5949/liverpool/9781846319587.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 19th-century and Victorian Literature
Beastly Journeys examines metaphors of travel and transformation in a range of texts published between 1885 and 1900. It places these texts in their socio-economic context and argues that their ...
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Beastly Journeys examines metaphors of travel and transformation in a range of texts published between 1885 and 1900. It places these texts in their socio-economic context and argues that their narratives of alteration from human to animal shape, which occur in response to social and economic shifts, reflect changes to the social body. Less
Beastly Journeys examines metaphors of travel and transformation in a range of texts published between 1885 and 1900. It places these texts in their socio-economic context and argues that their narratives of alteration from human to animal shape, which occur in response to social and economic shifts, reflect changes to the social body.
Marilyn Booth
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780748694860
- eISBN:
- 9781474408639
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748694860.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Literature
This book history scrutinizes the production, advertising, contents, compilation and circulation – locally and globally – of an Arabic-language volume of biographies of world women, al-Durr ...
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This book history scrutinizes the production, advertising, contents, compilation and circulation – locally and globally – of an Arabic-language volume of biographies of world women, al-Durr al-manthur fi tabaqat rabbat al-khudur. The analysis of this volume of over 500 folio-size pages views it as an early work of Arab feminist history within the prolific career of Zaynab Fawwaz (c1850-1914), a Lebanese immigrant to Egypt and early feminist writer there. The study considers how Fawwaz drew on the venerable tradition of biography writing in Arabic but also turned to contemporary sources (magazines, an encyclopedia, world histories); how she centred Arab subjects and Islamic history but included women from across the world and from ancient eras right up to the fin-de-siècle; how she incorporated a quiet celebration of Shi‘i women (of which she was one), especially from the early Islamic period; how the work suggests a collective and cooperative female intellectual presence in the 1890s Arab capitals, and also responds to works on women’s history by her male contemporaries; and how Fawwaz’s writing became implicated in the project for a Women’s Library at the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Chicago.Less
This book history scrutinizes the production, advertising, contents, compilation and circulation – locally and globally – of an Arabic-language volume of biographies of world women, al-Durr al-manthur fi tabaqat rabbat al-khudur. The analysis of this volume of over 500 folio-size pages views it as an early work of Arab feminist history within the prolific career of Zaynab Fawwaz (c1850-1914), a Lebanese immigrant to Egypt and early feminist writer there. The study considers how Fawwaz drew on the venerable tradition of biography writing in Arabic but also turned to contemporary sources (magazines, an encyclopedia, world histories); how she centred Arab subjects and Islamic history but included women from across the world and from ancient eras right up to the fin-de-siècle; how she incorporated a quiet celebration of Shi‘i women (of which she was one), especially from the early Islamic period; how the work suggests a collective and cooperative female intellectual presence in the 1890s Arab capitals, and also responds to works on women’s history by her male contemporaries; and how Fawwaz’s writing became implicated in the project for a Women’s Library at the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Chicago.
Julian Wright
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- January 2022
- ISBN:
- 9780197266977
- eISBN:
- 9780191955488
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197266977.003.0001
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
Assessing the present as a locus of particularly intense reflection in Western Europe, during a period which has often been explored for its passing interest in futurism or alternatively its ...
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Assessing the present as a locus of particularly intense reflection in Western Europe, during a period which has often been explored for its passing interest in futurism or alternatively its obsession with decadence, this opening essay establishes the wider intellectual context for the essays that follow. It assesses the historiographical, philosophical and sociological interventions of the period under examination for their deepening of the cultural enquiry into the present that was being taken forward across different artforms, political discourses and individual experiences. It argues for a rethinking of the European ‘fin-de-siècle’ and an expanded frame of historical enquiry that traverses the First World War in assessing this vital period in European history. The humanity of the present is particularly at stake, both in the intellectual arguments about the present advanced during the period, which are surveyed rapidly in this introduction, and in the new cultural, artistic and political discoveries to be presented through the volume as a whole.Less
Assessing the present as a locus of particularly intense reflection in Western Europe, during a period which has often been explored for its passing interest in futurism or alternatively its obsession with decadence, this opening essay establishes the wider intellectual context for the essays that follow. It assesses the historiographical, philosophical and sociological interventions of the period under examination for their deepening of the cultural enquiry into the present that was being taken forward across different artforms, political discourses and individual experiences. It argues for a rethinking of the European ‘fin-de-siècle’ and an expanded frame of historical enquiry that traverses the First World War in assessing this vital period in European history. The humanity of the present is particularly at stake, both in the intellectual arguments about the present advanced during the period, which are surveyed rapidly in this introduction, and in the new cultural, artistic and political discoveries to be presented through the volume as a whole.
Josephine M. Guy (ed.)
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- September 2018
- ISBN:
- 9781474408912
- eISBN:
- 9781474445030
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474408912.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 19th-century and Victorian Literature
The 22 newly commissioned essays in this volume re-examine some of the key concepts taken to define the British fin se siècle while also introducing hitherto overlooked cultural phenomena, such as ...
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The 22 newly commissioned essays in this volume re-examine some of the key concepts taken to define the British fin se siècle while also introducing hitherto overlooked cultural phenomena, such as humanitarianism. The impact of research into material culture is explored; specifically, how the history of the book and of performance culture is changing our understanding of this period. A wide range of activities is discussed, from participation in avant-garde theatre to interior decoration, and from the publishing of poetry to forms of political and religious activism. Attention is also given to how the meaning of the fin de siècle is impacted by place, including the significance of cultural exchanges between Britain and countries such as Russia and Italy; the distinctiveness of the Irish and Scottish fin de siècles; as well as activities within different regions of England, such as in the Midlands cities of Birmingham and Nottingham. In contrast to recent research exploring the global or transnational dimensions of the fin de siècle, this volume focuses on micro- rather than macro-cultural issues, the research underpinning these essays highlighting a diversity of practices that developed along different timelines and in different geographical locations, and which do not cohere into any simple pattern. Nor is there any obvious point of their intersection which might be said to mark a cultural turning point. A question the volume as a whole thus aims to pose is whether there is anything to be gained by distinguishing all, of any, of these practices as ‘fin-de-siècle’?Less
The 22 newly commissioned essays in this volume re-examine some of the key concepts taken to define the British fin se siècle while also introducing hitherto overlooked cultural phenomena, such as humanitarianism. The impact of research into material culture is explored; specifically, how the history of the book and of performance culture is changing our understanding of this period. A wide range of activities is discussed, from participation in avant-garde theatre to interior decoration, and from the publishing of poetry to forms of political and religious activism. Attention is also given to how the meaning of the fin de siècle is impacted by place, including the significance of cultural exchanges between Britain and countries such as Russia and Italy; the distinctiveness of the Irish and Scottish fin de siècles; as well as activities within different regions of England, such as in the Midlands cities of Birmingham and Nottingham. In contrast to recent research exploring the global or transnational dimensions of the fin de siècle, this volume focuses on micro- rather than macro-cultural issues, the research underpinning these essays highlighting a diversity of practices that developed along different timelines and in different geographical locations, and which do not cohere into any simple pattern. Nor is there any obvious point of their intersection which might be said to mark a cultural turning point. A question the volume as a whole thus aims to pose is whether there is anything to be gained by distinguishing all, of any, of these practices as ‘fin-de-siècle’?
Julian Wright and Allegra Fryxell (eds)
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- January 2022
- ISBN:
- 9780197266977
- eISBN:
- 9780191955488
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197266977.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
Assessing the present as a locus of particularly intense reflection in Western Europe, during a period which has often been explored for its passing interest in futurism or alternatively its ...
More
Assessing the present as a locus of particularly intense reflection in Western Europe, during a period which has often been explored for its passing interest in futurism or alternatively its obsession with decadence, this book establishes the wider intellectual context. It assesses the historiographical, philosophical and sociological interventions of the period under examination for their deepening of the cultural enquiry into the present that was being taken forward across different artforms, political discourses and individual experiences. It argues for a rethinking of the European ‘fin-de-siècle’ and an expanded frame of historical enquiry that traverses the First World War in assessing this vital period in European history.Less
Assessing the present as a locus of particularly intense reflection in Western Europe, during a period which has often been explored for its passing interest in futurism or alternatively its obsession with decadence, this book establishes the wider intellectual context. It assesses the historiographical, philosophical and sociological interventions of the period under examination for their deepening of the cultural enquiry into the present that was being taken forward across different artforms, political discourses and individual experiences. It argues for a rethinking of the European ‘fin-de-siècle’ and an expanded frame of historical enquiry that traverses the First World War in assessing this vital period in European history.
Michael Shaw
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- May 2021
- ISBN:
- 9781474433952
- eISBN:
- 9781474477000
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474433952.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
As the Irish Revival took shape and the Home Rule debate dominated UK politics, what was happening in Scotland? This book reveals distinct but comparable concerns with cultural defence and revivalism ...
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As the Irish Revival took shape and the Home Rule debate dominated UK politics, what was happening in Scotland? This book reveals distinct but comparable concerns with cultural defence and revivalism in fin-de-siècle Scotland, evident in the work of a number of writers and artists including Robert Louis Stevenson, Patrick Geddes, Fiona Macleod, Charles Rennie Mackintosh, Mona Caird, Arthur Conan Doyle, John Duncan and various contributors to The Evergreen. Situating Scottish literature and art alongside international developments in culture, especially the rise of decadence, symbolism and Celticism, the book demonstrates the ways in which dissident fin-de-siècle styles and ideas supported and defined the Scottish Revival.Less
As the Irish Revival took shape and the Home Rule debate dominated UK politics, what was happening in Scotland? This book reveals distinct but comparable concerns with cultural defence and revivalism in fin-de-siècle Scotland, evident in the work of a number of writers and artists including Robert Louis Stevenson, Patrick Geddes, Fiona Macleod, Charles Rennie Mackintosh, Mona Caird, Arthur Conan Doyle, John Duncan and various contributors to The Evergreen. Situating Scottish literature and art alongside international developments in culture, especially the rise of decadence, symbolism and Celticism, the book demonstrates the ways in which dissident fin-de-siècle styles and ideas supported and defined the Scottish Revival.
Julian Johnson
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- May 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780195372397
- eISBN:
- 9780199870844
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195372397.003.0007
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western, Opera
This chapter explores Mahler's relationship to Viennese modernism in the context of the tensions (social, political, economic, philosophical) of Viennese modernity. It examines Mahler's relationship ...
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This chapter explores Mahler's relationship to Viennese modernism in the context of the tensions (social, political, economic, philosophical) of Viennese modernity. It examines Mahler's relationship to Klimt and the Secession, to the new philosophy of language in Mauthner and Wittgenstein, to the music of Strauss and the idea of programaticism, and to the music of the Schoenberg school. The cultural and aesthetic manifestations of modernism are, however, considered against the backdrop of the competing political voices in fin de siècle Vienna, voices heard running through Mahler's music. The symphonies of Mahler are often taken as powerful statements of the idea of German musical culture, as enshrined in symphonic music, but this is constantly questioned by the presence of “other” voices, preeminently associated with the idea of Jewishness. The divisions in contemporary reception of Mahler's music draw out this tension.Less
This chapter explores Mahler's relationship to Viennese modernism in the context of the tensions (social, political, economic, philosophical) of Viennese modernity. It examines Mahler's relationship to Klimt and the Secession, to the new philosophy of language in Mauthner and Wittgenstein, to the music of Strauss and the idea of programaticism, and to the music of the Schoenberg school. The cultural and aesthetic manifestations of modernism are, however, considered against the backdrop of the competing political voices in fin de siècle Vienna, voices heard running through Mahler's music. The symphonies of Mahler are often taken as powerful statements of the idea of German musical culture, as enshrined in symphonic music, but this is constantly questioned by the presence of “other” voices, preeminently associated with the idea of Jewishness. The divisions in contemporary reception of Mahler's music draw out this tension.
OWEN WHITE
- Published in print:
- 1999
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198208198
- eISBN:
- 9780191677946
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198208198.003.0008
- Subject:
- History, World Modern History
This chapter summarizes the preceding discussions. It examines the nature of mÉtis identity throughout the colonial period. Regarding the analysis of the links between the psychiatric profession and ...
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This chapter summarizes the preceding discussions. It examines the nature of mÉtis identity throughout the colonial period. Regarding the analysis of the links between the psychiatric profession and the legal system in fin-de-siècle France, it notes that the psychiatric concepts were founded by number of dichotomies including mind and body. Condemnation of miscegenation was never enough to prevent it from taking place in the colonies. The possibility for Africans to become citizens of France was a central element in the legitimizing concept of assimilation, which suggested a break with the traditional dichotomies of colonial rule.Less
This chapter summarizes the preceding discussions. It examines the nature of mÉtis identity throughout the colonial period. Regarding the analysis of the links between the psychiatric profession and the legal system in fin-de-siècle France, it notes that the psychiatric concepts were founded by number of dichotomies including mind and body. Condemnation of miscegenation was never enough to prevent it from taking place in the colonies. The possibility for Africans to become citizens of France was a central element in the legitimizing concept of assimilation, which suggested a break with the traditional dichotomies of colonial rule.
Sophie Duncan
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- January 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780198790846
- eISBN:
- 9780191833298
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198790846.003.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Shakespeare Studies, 19th-century and Victorian Literature
Star Victorian Shakespearean actresses had immense artistic, economic, and social volition. Their most iconoclastic fin-de-siècle performances became crucibles for debates on gender and sexuality in ...
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Star Victorian Shakespearean actresses had immense artistic, economic, and social volition. Their most iconoclastic fin-de-siècle performances became crucibles for debates on gender and sexuality in popular theatre, despite scholarship’s emphasis on Ibsen, Shaw, and ‘sex problem’ plays. Actresses’ movements between Shakespearean and fin-de-siècle roles reveal consonances and collisions within the fin-de-siècle repertory. Fin-de-siècle Shakespeare and contemporary Victorian theatre culture conditioned each other in unexpected ways. These performers’ self-promotion has the power to disrupt our historiographies of both celebrity and the theatrical event. Shakespeare performance traditions moved between actresses via little-studied performance genealogies and thriving creative networks, in ways that tendencies in Shakespeare studies have sometimes obscured.Less
Star Victorian Shakespearean actresses had immense artistic, economic, and social volition. Their most iconoclastic fin-de-siècle performances became crucibles for debates on gender and sexuality in popular theatre, despite scholarship’s emphasis on Ibsen, Shaw, and ‘sex problem’ plays. Actresses’ movements between Shakespearean and fin-de-siècle roles reveal consonances and collisions within the fin-de-siècle repertory. Fin-de-siècle Shakespeare and contemporary Victorian theatre culture conditioned each other in unexpected ways. These performers’ self-promotion has the power to disrupt our historiographies of both celebrity and the theatrical event. Shakespeare performance traditions moved between actresses via little-studied performance genealogies and thriving creative networks, in ways that tendencies in Shakespeare studies have sometimes obscured.
Robert Mighall
- Published in print:
- 2003
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780199262182
- eISBN:
- 9780191698835
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199262182.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 19th-century and Victorian Literature
This book is a full-length study of Victorian Gothic fiction. Combining original readings of familiar texts with historical sources, this book is a historicist survey of 19th-century Gothic ...
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This book is a full-length study of Victorian Gothic fiction. Combining original readings of familiar texts with historical sources, this book is a historicist survey of 19th-century Gothic writing—from Dickens to Stoker, Wilkie Collins to Conan Doyle, through European travelogues, sexological textbooks, ecclesiastic histories and pamphlets on the perils of self-abuse. Critics have thus far tended to concentrate on specific angles of Gothic writing (gender or race), or the belief that the Gothic ‘returned’ at the so-called fin de siècle. By contrast, this book demonstrates how the Gothic mode was active throughout the Victorian period, and provides historical explanations for its development from the late 18th century, through the ‘Urban Gothic’ fictions of the mid-Victorian period, the ‘Suburban Gothic’ of the Sensation vogue, through to the somatic horrors of Stevenson, Machen, Stoker, and Doyle at the century' close. The book challenges the psychological approach to Gothic fiction that currently prevails, demonstrating the importance of geographical, historical, and discursive factors that have been largely neglected by critics, and employing a variety of original sources to demonstrate the contexts of Gothic fiction and explain its development in the Victorian period.Less
This book is a full-length study of Victorian Gothic fiction. Combining original readings of familiar texts with historical sources, this book is a historicist survey of 19th-century Gothic writing—from Dickens to Stoker, Wilkie Collins to Conan Doyle, through European travelogues, sexological textbooks, ecclesiastic histories and pamphlets on the perils of self-abuse. Critics have thus far tended to concentrate on specific angles of Gothic writing (gender or race), or the belief that the Gothic ‘returned’ at the so-called fin de siècle. By contrast, this book demonstrates how the Gothic mode was active throughout the Victorian period, and provides historical explanations for its development from the late 18th century, through the ‘Urban Gothic’ fictions of the mid-Victorian period, the ‘Suburban Gothic’ of the Sensation vogue, through to the somatic horrors of Stevenson, Machen, Stoker, and Doyle at the century' close. The book challenges the psychological approach to Gothic fiction that currently prevails, demonstrating the importance of geographical, historical, and discursive factors that have been largely neglected by critics, and employing a variety of original sources to demonstrate the contexts of Gothic fiction and explain its development in the Victorian period.
Lawrence Danson
- Published in print:
- 1998
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780198186281
- eISBN:
- 9780191674488
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198186281.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 19th-century and Victorian Literature
What were Oscar Wilde's intentions? They had always been suspect, from the time of Poems, when the charge was plagiarism, to his trials, when the charge was sodomy. In Intentions (1891), the book on ...
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What were Oscar Wilde's intentions? They had always been suspect, from the time of Poems, when the charge was plagiarism, to his trials, when the charge was sodomy. In Intentions (1891), the book on which his claim as a theoretical critic chiefly lies, and in two related essays, ‘The Portrait of Mr W. H.’ and ‘The Soul of Man Under Socialism’, Wilde's epigrammatic dazzle and paradoxical subversions both reveal and mask his designs upon fin-de-siecle society. This extended study of Wilde's criticism examines these essays/dialogues/fictions (unsettling the categories was one of their intentions) and assesses their achievement. The book sets Wilde's criticism in context. It shows how the son of an Irish patriot sought to create a new ideal of English culture by elevating ‘lies’ above history, levelling the distinction between artist and critic, and ending the sway of ‘nature’ over liberated human desire.Less
What were Oscar Wilde's intentions? They had always been suspect, from the time of Poems, when the charge was plagiarism, to his trials, when the charge was sodomy. In Intentions (1891), the book on which his claim as a theoretical critic chiefly lies, and in two related essays, ‘The Portrait of Mr W. H.’ and ‘The Soul of Man Under Socialism’, Wilde's epigrammatic dazzle and paradoxical subversions both reveal and mask his designs upon fin-de-siecle society. This extended study of Wilde's criticism examines these essays/dialogues/fictions (unsettling the categories was one of their intentions) and assesses their achievement. The book sets Wilde's criticism in context. It shows how the son of an Irish patriot sought to create a new ideal of English culture by elevating ‘lies’ above history, levelling the distinction between artist and critic, and ending the sway of ‘nature’ over liberated human desire.
Ruth Harris
- Published in print:
- 1991
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198202592
- eISBN:
- 9780191675430
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198202592.003.0003
- Subject:
- History, British and Irish Modern History, History of Science, Technology, and Medicine
Psychiatric concepts were constructed around certain key dichotomies: normal and pathological, mind and body, higher and lower, right and left, equilibrium and destabilization, economy and excess, ...
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Psychiatric concepts were constructed around certain key dichotomies: normal and pathological, mind and body, higher and lower, right and left, equilibrium and destabilization, economy and excess, control and disinhibition. Such designations generated intense controversy both within the medical community and from those outside it who were concerned with the implications of scientific knowledge for moral, social, and political authority. As this chapter shows, the doctors' chief antagonists and collaborators in this period were jurists who, through their own confrontation with developments in the social sciences, found some common ground with medical men in revising interpretations of moral responsibility. Despite the inevitable wrangles over the issue of criminal insanity which periodically marred the relationship between jurists and psychiatrists in court, the fin de siècle was nonetheless distinguished for the collaboration between the two professions in forging new directions in the field of criminal management.Less
Psychiatric concepts were constructed around certain key dichotomies: normal and pathological, mind and body, higher and lower, right and left, equilibrium and destabilization, economy and excess, control and disinhibition. Such designations generated intense controversy both within the medical community and from those outside it who were concerned with the implications of scientific knowledge for moral, social, and political authority. As this chapter shows, the doctors' chief antagonists and collaborators in this period were jurists who, through their own confrontation with developments in the social sciences, found some common ground with medical men in revising interpretations of moral responsibility. Despite the inevitable wrangles over the issue of criminal insanity which periodically marred the relationship between jurists and psychiatrists in court, the fin de siècle was nonetheless distinguished for the collaboration between the two professions in forging new directions in the field of criminal management.
C. W. Thompson
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- January 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780199233540
- eISBN:
- 9780191730948
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199233540.003.0013
- Subject:
- Literature, European Literature, 19th-century Literature and Romanticism
French Romantic novels and travelogues had helped each other to enrich description. Yet at their best, Nodier, Stendhal, Hugo, and Nerval showed that description was most effective when not allowed ...
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French Romantic novels and travelogues had helped each other to enrich description. Yet at their best, Nodier, Stendhal, Hugo, and Nerval showed that description was most effective when not allowed to dominate in narratives blending personal adventures and impressions with contemporary, historical, and legendary stories. After 1850, this balance would be upset as travelogues succumbed to the pressures for more precision and description exerted by positivism, photography, and other multiplying sources of information. The genre lost its way, becoming overwhelmed either by stories (late Dumas), or by description (late Gautier). However brilliant the descriptions of the latter's Italia (1852) and Constantinople (1853), the almost exclusive concern of such works with picturesque surfaces heralds the onset of a decadent strain that would culminate in the aesthetically titillating fin de siècle travelogues of Loti and Lorrain. The essential balance sought by the Romantics had more of a future, as foretold already by Fromentin.Less
French Romantic novels and travelogues had helped each other to enrich description. Yet at their best, Nodier, Stendhal, Hugo, and Nerval showed that description was most effective when not allowed to dominate in narratives blending personal adventures and impressions with contemporary, historical, and legendary stories. After 1850, this balance would be upset as travelogues succumbed to the pressures for more precision and description exerted by positivism, photography, and other multiplying sources of information. The genre lost its way, becoming overwhelmed either by stories (late Dumas), or by description (late Gautier). However brilliant the descriptions of the latter's Italia (1852) and Constantinople (1853), the almost exclusive concern of such works with picturesque surfaces heralds the onset of a decadent strain that would culminate in the aesthetically titillating fin de siècle travelogues of Loti and Lorrain. The essential balance sought by the Romantics had more of a future, as foretold already by Fromentin.
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- June 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780804770644
- eISBN:
- 9780804777247
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Stanford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.11126/stanford/9780804770644.003.0009
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Jewish Studies
The issues of sexuality and gender roles became prevalent during the fin de siècle and in subsequent years, during which period Hebrew and Yiddish writers explored the ways that erotic desire played ...
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The issues of sexuality and gender roles became prevalent during the fin de siècle and in subsequent years, during which period Hebrew and Yiddish writers explored the ways that erotic desire played an important role in rabbinic culture and East European Jewish culture. This chapter examines the “sexual turn” in Hebrew modernist fiction. It explores the ways in which Hebrew writers deal with the crisis of masculine identity, the rise of the “New Woman,” and the Zionist attempts to transform sexuality and masculinity and the antisemitic views of the “effeminate Jew.”Less
The issues of sexuality and gender roles became prevalent during the fin de siècle and in subsequent years, during which period Hebrew and Yiddish writers explored the ways that erotic desire played an important role in rabbinic culture and East European Jewish culture. This chapter examines the “sexual turn” in Hebrew modernist fiction. It explores the ways in which Hebrew writers deal with the crisis of masculine identity, the rise of the “New Woman,” and the Zionist attempts to transform sexuality and masculinity and the antisemitic views of the “effeminate Jew.”
Lou Charnon-Deutsch and Jo Labanyi (eds)
- Published in print:
- 1996
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198158868
- eISBN:
- 9780191673399
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198158868.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, European Literature, 19th-century and Victorian Literature
This book features a wide-ranging discussion on women's writing and representations of gender in Spanish literature and culture from the Romantic period to the fin de siècle. It is customary to ...
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This book features a wide-ranging discussion on women's writing and representations of gender in Spanish literature and culture from the Romantic period to the fin de siècle. It is customary to regard gender roles and representation in 19th-century Spain as polarised and predictable. But in this volume, scholars from the United Kingdom and the United States discuss not only the patriarchal emphasis of Spanish culture, but also demonstrate that this was a period in which relations between men and women were being constantly negotiated, challenged, and redefined as part of an ongoing transformation of political and national identities. Contributions look at women's writing and the representation of women in canonical texts, the construction of both femininity and masculinity, issues of race and region, and popular fiction, journalism, and the visual arts. All quotations are given in Spanish with English translation.Less
This book features a wide-ranging discussion on women's writing and representations of gender in Spanish literature and culture from the Romantic period to the fin de siècle. It is customary to regard gender roles and representation in 19th-century Spain as polarised and predictable. But in this volume, scholars from the United Kingdom and the United States discuss not only the patriarchal emphasis of Spanish culture, but also demonstrate that this was a period in which relations between men and women were being constantly negotiated, challenged, and redefined as part of an ongoing transformation of political and national identities. Contributions look at women's writing and the representation of women in canonical texts, the construction of both femininity and masculinity, issues of race and region, and popular fiction, journalism, and the visual arts. All quotations are given in Spanish with English translation.
