| Description |
1 online resource (229 pages) |
| Contents |
Women and 'Value' in Jane Austen's Novels; Preface; Contents; 1 Introduction; Notes; 2 Money, Value, and Circulation; History and Fiction; Constructing Economic Value; The Fiction of Circulation; Adam Smith and Value; Notes; 3 Marriage, Credit, and a Woman's Education; Marriage Law and the Marriage Market; Women and Credit in Fiction; Women's Education and Conduct; Notes; 4 Sense and Settling; Miss Lucas's Schemes; Maria's Duty; Jane's Choice; Settling into the Shadows; Notes; 5 Speculation and Predatory Behavior; Isabella's Great Beauty; Lucy Is Monstrous Pretty; Mary's Lively Dark Eye |
|
Speculators and Fluctuating ValueNotes; 6 Superfluous, Invisible, and Invalid; The Spinster; The Widow; Left on the Shelf; Notes; 7 The Minor Protagonist, or the Reluctant Heroine; Valuing Women in Jane Austen's Novels; Notes; Bibliography; Index |
| Summary |
Jane Austen's minor female characters expose the economic and social realties of British women in the long eighteenth century and reflect the conflict between intrinsic and expressed value within the evolving marketplace, where fluctuations and fictions inherent in the economic and moral value structures are exposed. Just as the newly-minted paper money was struggling to express its value, so do Austen's minor female characters struggle to assert their intrinsic value within a marketplace that expresses their worth as bearers of dowries. Austen's minor female characters expose the plight of women who settle for transactional marriages, become speculators and predators, or become superfluous women who have left the marriage market and battle for personal significance and existence. These characters illustrate the ambiguity of value within the marriage market economy, exposing women's limited choices. This book employs a socio-historical framework, considering the rise of a competitive consumer economy juxtaposed with affective individualism |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references and index |
| Notes |
Print version record |
| Subject |
Austen, Jane, 1775-1817 -- Characters -- Women
|
|
Austen, Jane, 1775-1817 -- Criticism and interpretation
|
| SUBJECT |
Austen, Jane, 1775-1817 fast |
| Subject |
English fiction -- Women authors -- History and criticism
|
|
English fiction -- 19th century -- History and criticism
|
|
Women in literature.
|
|
English fiction
|
|
English fiction -- Women authors
|
|
Women in literature
|
| Genre/Form |
Criticism, interpretation, etc.
|
| Form |
Electronic book
|
| ISBN |
9783319507361 |
|
3319507362 |
|
