Title: Unbecoming women : British women writers and the novel of development /
Authors: Fraiman, Susan.
Publisher: Columbia University Press,
Year: 1993
Subjects: English fiction Women authors History and criticism; Women and literature Great Britain History.; Bildungsromans.; Psychological fiction, English History and criticism.; Maturation (Psychology) in literature.; Bildungsromans, English History and criticism.
Abstract: "Is there a "female Bildungsroman"? Can the story of Elizabeth Bennet's development be yoked to a genre conceived in terms of Wilhelm Meister and David Copperfield? Unbecoming Women unpacks the ideological baggage of the Bildungsroman, and turns to novels of development and conduct books by women for a new poetics of growing up." "In subtle readings of works by Frances Burney, Jane Austen, Charlotte Bronte, and George Elliot, Susan Fraiman argues that a heroine's progress toward masterful selfhood is by no means assured. Focusing on "counternarratives" in which girls do not enter the world so much as flounder on its doorstep, Fraiman suggests that becoming a woman involves de-formation, disorientation, and the loss of authority." "By stressing the rival stories in a single text, Unbecoming Women provides a fresh assessment of the Bildungsroman. Instead of the usual question - "How does the hero of this novel come of age?"--Fraiman asks "What are the divergent developmental narratives at work, and what can they tell us about competing ideologies concerning the feminine?"" "Written with grace and theoretical mastery, Unbecoming Women emphasizes the subversive as well as dialectical aspects of a genre long considered homogeneous. The result is a compelling work of literary criticism that, charting female destiny in Georgian and Victorian texts, also post-modernizes the novel of development."--Jacket.
Contents: Is there a female Bildungsroman? -- Getting waylaid in Evelina -- The humiliation of Elizabeth Bennet -- Jane Eyre's fall from grace -- The Mill on the floss, the critics, and the Bildungsroman.