Bleak houses : marital violence in Victorian fiction / Lisa Surridge.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Surridge, Lisa A. (Lisa Anne), 1963-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Abused women in literature.

Child abuse in literature.

Domestic fiction, English--History and criticism.

Domestic fiction, English.

English fiction--19th century--History and criticism.

English fiction.

Family violence in literature.

Marriage in literature.

Violence in literature.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (271 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Athens : Ohio University Press, c2005.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

The Offenses Against the Person Act of 1828 opened magistrates' courts to abused working-class wives. Newspapers in turn reported on these proceedings, and in this way the Victorian scrutiny of domestic conduct began. But how did popular fiction treat "private" family violence? Bleak Houses: Marital Violence in Victorian Fiction traces novelists' engagement with the wife-assault debates in the public press between 1828 and the turn of the century. Lisa Surridge examines the early works of Charles Dickens and reads Dombey and Son and Anne Brontë's The Tenant of Wildfell Hall in the context of

Contents:

Private violence in the public eye: the early writings of Charles Dickens

Domestic violence and middle-class manliness: Dombey and Son

From regency violence to Victorian feminism: The tenant of Wildfell Hall

The abused woman and the community: "Janet's repentance"

Strange revelations: the divorce court, the newspaper, and The woman in white

The private eye and the public gaze: He knew he was right

Marital violence and the new woman: The wing of Azrael

"Are women protected?" Sherlock Holmes and the violent home.

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references (p. 255-262) and index.

ISBN:

9780821441992

082144199X

OCLC:

889675562