Consumerism and American Girls' Literature, 1860-1940

Erscheinungsjahr 2015
ISBN: 978-0-521-82187-2
Verlag: Cambridge University Press

Buch, Englisch, Band 134, 178 Seiten, Format (B × H): 157 mm x 235 mm, Gewicht: 417 g

Reihe: Cambridge Studies in American Literature and Culture

Why did the figure of the girl come to dominate the American imagination from the middle of the nineteenth century into the twentieth? In Consumerism and American Girls' Literature Peter Stoneley looks at how women fictionalized for the girl reader the ways of achieving a powerful social and cultural presence. He explores why and how a scenario of 'buying into womanhood' became, between 1860 and 1940, one of the nation's central allegories, one of its favourite means of negotiating social change. From Jo March to Nancy Drew, girls' fiction operated in dynamic relation to consumerism, performing a series of otherwise awkward manoeuvres: between country and metropolis, uncouth and unspoilt, modern and anti-modern. Covering a wide range of works and authors, this book will be of interest to cultural and literary scholars alike.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Stoneley, Peter

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Literaturwissenschaft Literaturwissenschaft
• Geisteswissenschaften Literaturwissenschaft Literaturtheorie: Poetik und Literaturästhetik

Inhaltsverzeichnis

List of illustrations; Acknowledgments; Introduction: 'buying into womanhood'; Part I. Emergence: 1. The fate of modesty; 2. Magazines and money; 3. Dramas of exclusion; Part II. Fulfillment: 4. Romantic speculations; 5. Preparing for leisure; 6. Serial pleasures; Part III. Revision: 7. The clean and the dirty; 8. 'Black Tuesday'; Conclusion; Notes; Index.

Über Autor(innen)

Stoneley, Peter
Peter Stoneley is Lecturer in the School of English at Queen's University, Belfast. He is the author of Mark Twain and the Feminine Aesthetic (Cambridge, 1992).