Title Mothers of the nation : women's political writing in England, 1780-1830 / Anne K. Mellor

Published Bloomington : Indiana University Press, ©2000

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Description 1 online resource (172 pages) : illustrations Series Women of letters Women of letters (Bloomington, Ind.) Contents Title Page; Copyright Page; Table of Contents; Acknowledgments; Introduction; 1 Hannah More, Revolutionary Reformer; 2 Theater as the School of Virtue; 3 Women's Political Poetry; 4 Literary Criticism, Cultural Authority, and the Rise of the Novel; 5 The Politics of Fiction; Desmond; Persuasion; Postscript; Notes; Works Cited; Index Summary British women writers were enormously influential in the creation of public opinion and political ideology during the years from 1780 to 1830. Anne Mellor demonstrates the many ways in which they attempted to shape British public policy and cultural behavior in the areas of religious and governmental reform, education, philanthropy, and patterns of consumption. She argues that the theoretical paradigm of the "doctrine of the separate spheres"may no longer be valid. According to this view, British society was divided into distinctly differentiated and gendered spheres of public versus private activities in the 18th and 19th centuries, Surveying all the genres of literature'drama, poetry, fiction, non-fiction prose, and literary criticism'Mellor shows how women writers promoted a new concept of the ideal woman as rationally educated, sexually self-disciplined, and above all, virtuous. This New Woman, these writers said, was better suited to govern the nation than were its current fiscally irresponsible, lecherous, and corruptible male rulers. Beginning with Hannah More, Mellor argues that women writers too often dismissed as conservative or retrogressive instead promoted a revolution in cultural mores or manners. She discusses writers as diverse as Elizabeth Inchbald, Hannah Cowley, and Joanna Baillie; as Charlotte Smith, Anna Barbauld, and Lucy Aikin; as Mary Wollstonecraft, Charlotte Reeve, and Anna Seward; and concludes with extended analyses of Charlotte Smith's Desmond and Jane Austen's Persuasion. She thus documents women writers' full participation in that very discursive public sphere which Habermas so famously restricted to men of property. Moreover, the new career of philanthropy defined by Hannah More provided a practical means by which women of all classes could actively construct a new British civil society, and thus become the mothers not only of individual households but of the nation as a whole Bibliography Includes bibliographical references (pages 151-163) and index Notes Master and use copy. Digital master created according to Benchmark for Faithful Digital Reproductions of Monographs and Serials, Version 1. Digital Library Federation, December 2002. http://purl.oclc.org/DLF/benchrepro0212 MiAaHDL digitized 2010 HathiTrust Digital Library committed to preserve pda MiAaHDL Print version record Subject English literature -- 19th century -- History and criticism Politics and literature -- Great Britain -- History -- 19th century Politics and literature -- Great Britain -- History -- 18th century English literature -- Women authors -- History and criticism English literature -- 18th century -- History and criticism Women and literature -- England -- History -- 19th century Women and literature -- England -- History -- 18th century Women authors, English -- Political and social views English literature -- History and criticism. LITERARY CRITICISM -- European -- English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh. English literature English literature -- Women authors Politics and government Politics and literature Women and literature SUBJECT Great Britain -- Politics and government -- 1760-1820. http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85056908 Great Britain -- Politics and government -- 1820-1830. http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85056912 Subject England Great Britain Genre/Form Criticism, interpretation, etc. History Form Electronic book LC no. 99047328 ISBN 9780253028198 0253028191

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