Over her dead body : death, femininity and the aesthetic / Elisabeth Bronfen.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Bronfen, Elisabeth, Author.

Series:

Manchester Gothic (Manchester, England).

Manchester Gothic

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Death in literature.

Women in literature.

Femininity in literature.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (460 pages) : illustrations (black & white); digital, PDF file(s).

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Manchester, UK : Manchester University Press, 2017.

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

The argument that this book presents is that narrative and visual representations of death can be read as symptoms of our culture and because the feminine body is culturally constructed as the superlative site of "other" and "not me", culture uses art to dream the deaths of beautiful women.

In 1846, Edgar Allen Poe wrote that 'the death of a beautiful woman is, unquestionably, the most poetic topic in the world'. The conjuction of death, art and femininity forms a rich and disturbing strata of Western culture, explored here in fascinating detail by Elisabeth Bronfen. Her examples range from Carmen to Little Nell, from Wuthering Heights to Vertigo, from Snow White to Frankenstein. The text is richly illustrated throughout with thirty-seven paintings and photographs.

Contents:

Part I : Death : the epitome of tropes. Preparation for an autopsy ; The lady vanishes ; Violence of representation : representation of violence

Part II : Rom animate body to inanimate text. The 'most' poetic topic ; Deathbed scenes ; Bodies on display ; The lady is a portrait ; Noli me videre ; Case Study : Wife to Mr Rossetti, Elizabeth Siddall (1829-62)

Part III : Strategies of translation, mitigation and exchange. Sacrificing extremity ; Femininity : missing in action ; Close encounters of a fatal kind

Part IV : Stabilising the ambivalence of repetition. The speculated woman ; Rigor has set in : the wasted bride ; Necromancy, or closing the crack on the gravestone ; Risky resemblances ; Spectral stories ; The dead beloved as muse ; Case study : Henry's sister, Alice James (1848-92)

Conclusion : Aporias of resistance. From muse to creatrix : Snow White unbound.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 436-452) and index.

Description based on print record.

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

ISBN:

9781526125637

9781526125644

OCLC:

1472987841