Remaking Queen Victoria
Published on 2. October 1997
Book
Hardback
296 pages
978-0-521-57379-5 (ISBN)
Description
Queen Victoria's central importance to the era defined by her reign is self-evident, and yet it has been surprisingly overlooked in the study of Victorian culture. This collection of essays goes beyond the facts of biography and official history to explore the diverse, and sometimes conflicting, meanings she held for her subjects around the world and even for those outside her empire, who made of her a multifaceted icon serving their social and economic needs. In her paradoxical position as neither consort nor king, she baffled expectations throughout her reign. She was a model of wifely decorum and solid middle-class values, but she also became the focus of anxieties about powerful women, and - increasingly - of anger about Britain's imperial aims. Each essay analyses a different aspect of this complex and fascinating figure. Contributors include noted scholars in the field of literature, cultural studies, art history, and women's studies.
Reviews / Votes
"...an invaluable resource which could easily...be used as a text in classes in several disciplines." Rosemary T. VanArsdel, Victorian Periodicals "Excellent essays by Alison Booth, Elizabeth Langland, Robin L. Bott, Maria Jerinic, and Karen Chase and Michael Levenson explore the ways that Victoria both informed and was appropriated by the culture of her time. This book is a fine contribution to cultural studies of Victoria in all her many incarnations." Joseph W. Childers "Containing twelve thought-provoking essays, this collection ensures that Victoria now has fewer places to hide before the scholarly eye." Nineteenth-Century Literature "...essays here raise interesting questions, questions which could concern historians." Dorothy Thompson, Victorian StudiesMore details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Cambridge
United Kingdom
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Illustrations
19 Halftones, unspecified
Dimensions
Height: 235 mm
Width: 157 mm
Thickness: 22 mm
Weight
634 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-521-57379-5 (9780521573795)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Persons
Content
List of illustrations; Notes on contributors; 1. Introduction Margaret Homans and Adrienne Munich; Part I. Nation-Making: 2. Nation and nationality: Queen Victoria in the developing narrative of Englishness Elizabeth Langland; 3. Crossing the Atlantic with Victoria: American receptions, 1837-1901 Mary Loeffelholz; Part II. Queen Victoria and Other Queens: 4. Illustrious company: Victoria among other women in Anglo-American role model anthologies Alison Booth; 5. Gloriana Victoriana: Victoria and the cultural memory of Elizabeth I Nicola J. Watson; 6. 'Be no more housewives, but queens': Queen Victoria and Ruskin's domestic mythology Sharon Aronofsky Weltman; 7. How we lost the empire: retelling the stories of the Rani of Jansi and Queen Victoria Maria Jerinic; 8. 'I know what is due to me': self-fashioning and legitimization in Queen Liliuokalani's Hawaii's Story by Hawaii's Queen Robin Bott; Part III. Victoria's Career, Early and Late: 9. Reading and writing Victoria: the conduct book and the legal constitution of female sovereignty Gail Turley Houston; 10. The wise child and her 'offspring': some changing faces of Queen Victoria Susan P. Casteras; '11. I never saw a man so frightened': the young queen and the Parliamentary bedchamber Karen Chase and Michael Levenson; 12. The 'Widdy's' empire: Queen Victoria as widow in Kipling's soldier stories and in the Barrack-Room Ballads Dagni Bredeson; Part IV. Afterlife: 13. Queen Victoria in the Funnyhouse: Adrienne Kennedy and the rituals of colonial possession Janet Winston; Bibliography; Index.