This thesis discusses the representation of spinsters in mid-Victorian literary fiction, examining how different authors deviate from the negative view of these unmarried women and respond to the...Show moreThis thesis discusses the representation of spinsters in mid-Victorian literary fiction, examining how different authors deviate from the negative view of these unmarried women and respond to the contemporary debate on their ‘superfluity’. It analyses the representation of spinsterhood in three novels from the mid-Victorian period: Elizabeth Gaskell’s Cranford (1853); Charlotte Brontë’s Villette (1853); and Charles Dickens’s Great Expectations (1861). This thesis argues that these authors take spinsters out of their marginal space, and present them at the heart of their texts. Moreover, by granting spinsters a central position and considerable power, these mid-Victorian authors validate their existence, oppose their ‘superfluity’, and demonstrate that women can be unmarried and independent instead of relying on men.Show less
I will start by touching on the existing scholarship centering around the language use of the authors in question, from a literary and linguistic point of view. Additionally, I will look at the...Show moreI will start by touching on the existing scholarship centering around the language use of the authors in question, from a literary and linguistic point of view. Additionally, I will look at the previous studies on these authors’ perspective on women, as expressed in their work. Then I will discuss the methodology with which I researched the gendering of the modal verbs used by these authors. Next, using a corpus tool, I will review the resulting collocations, clusters, and concordance lists and analyse these findings in terms of the deontic modality associated with the female characters. Finally, I will try to establish if the male and female authors differ in the type and amount of modal verbs used to represent female characters.Show less
This thesis investigates the role of rural, urban, and industrial landscapes in Charles Dickens’s Hard Times, Benjamin Disraeli’s Sybil, and Elizabeth Gaskell’s North and South and Mary Barton....Show moreThis thesis investigates the role of rural, urban, and industrial landscapes in Charles Dickens’s Hard Times, Benjamin Disraeli’s Sybil, and Elizabeth Gaskell’s North and South and Mary Barton. These four novels focus on the social turbulences surrounding industrialisation and are all set in an industrial town in the north of England. In each novel, the descriptions of rural, urban and industrial landscapes support that novel’s view on industrialisation and the subsequent social tensions.Show less
Research master thesis | Literary Studies (research) (MA)
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Charles Dickens (1812-1870) is mainly known for his Victorian novels. However, Dickens pursued a lifelong relationship with the theatrical world. This thesis aims at exploring this relationship,...Show moreCharles Dickens (1812-1870) is mainly known for his Victorian novels. However, Dickens pursued a lifelong relationship with the theatrical world. This thesis aims at exploring this relationship, taking into account two theatrical adaptations of Dickens’ novel "Bleak House" in 1853: James Elphinstone and Frederic Neale’s "‘Bleak House’, a drama in two acts", performed at the City of London Theatre in June 1853, and George Dibdin Pitt’s "The Bleak House, or the Spectre of the Ghost Walk", performed at the Royal Pavilion Theatre, also in June 1853, before the final instalments of the novel had been published. The main focus of this analysis is the investigation of Gothic motifs present in Dickens’ novel, and how they were represented in these two productions. The conclusion is that these Gothic elements were enhanced on stage by means of textual selections, set arrangements and plot focused on the Dedlocks’ Ghost legend, illustrating the sensationalist character of the nineteenth-century melodramatic theatre. Furthermore, the focus on spectacle also resulted in an impoverishment of the social criticism layer present in Dickens’ novel, demonstrating the productions’ focus on entertainment, in accordance with the theatres’ purposes and target audience in the East End area in London in the nineteenth century.Show less
