| Description |
1 online resource (x, 237 pages.) |
| Series |
Palgrave studies in literature, science and medicine, 2634-6443 |
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Palgrave studies in literature, science, and medicine, 2634-6443
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| Contents |
Introduction -- Chapter 1: Fashionable Diseases: Consumerism, Class, and Health in the Silver Fork Novels -- Chapter 2: "Unblessed by Offspring": Fertility and the Aristocratic Male in Reynold's The Mysteries of the Court of London -- Chapter 3: Aristocratic Inbreeding: Exogamy and Endogamy in Sensation Fiction -- Chapter 4: Aristocratic Origins, Heredity, and Evolution in the Fin de Siècle Medieval Revival -- Conclusion |
| Summary |
Science, Medicine, and Lineage in Popular Fiction of the Long Nineteenth Century explores the dialogue between popular literature and medical and scientific discourse in terms of how they represent the highly visible an pathologized British aristocratic body. This books explores and complicates the two major portrayals of aristocrats in nineteenth-century literature: that of the medicalised, frail, debauched, and diseased aristocrat, and that of the heroic, active, beautiful 'noble', both of which are frequent and resonant in popular fiction of the long nineteenth century. Abigail Boucher argues that the concept of class in the long nineteenth century implicitly includes notions of blood, lineage, and bodily 'correctness', and that 'class' was therefore frequently portrayed as an empirical, scientific, and medical certainty. Due to their elevated and highly visual social positions, both historical and fictional aristocrats were frequently pathologized in the public mind and watched for signs of physical excellence or deviance. Using popular fiction, Boucher establishes patterns across decades, genres, and demographics and considers how these patterns react to, normalise, or feed into the advent of new scientific and medical understandings |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references and index |
| Notes |
Online resource; title from PDF title page (SpringerLink, viewed September 7, 2023) |
| Subject |
English fiction -- 19th century -- History and criticism
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Science in literature.
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Medicine in literature.
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Aristocracy (Social class) in literature.
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Aristocracy (Social class) in literature.
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English fiction.
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Medicine in literature.
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Science in literature.
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| Genre/Form |
Criticism, interpretation, etc.
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| Form |
Electronic book
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| ISBN |
9783031411410 |
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3031411412 |
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