Consuming fantasies
Subtitle: labor, leisure, and the London shopgirl, 1880-1920
By: Lise Shapiro Sanders.
Publisher: Ohio State University Press
Published: 2006
Place of publication: Columbus
Language: eng
Number of pages: 279
Subjects: English literature -- 19th century -- History and criticism; Women sales personnel in literature; English literature -- 20th century -- History and criticism; Women sales personnel -- England -- London -- History; Working class women -- England -- London -- History; Department stores -- England -- London -- History; Retail trade -- England -- London -- History; Women and literature -- England -- London; Sex role in literature; London (England) -- In literature
Description: "In Consuming Fantasies: Labor, Leisure, and the London Shopgirl, 1880-1920, Lise Shapiro Sanders examines the cultural significance of the shopgirl - both historical figure and fictional heroine - from the end of Queen Victoria's reign through the First World War. As the author reveals, the shopgirl embodied the fantasies associated with a growing consumer culture: romantic adventure, upward mobility, and the acquisition of material goods. Reading novels such as George Gissing's The Odd Women and W. Somerset Maugham's Of Human Bondage as well as short stories, musical comedies, and films, Sanders argues that the London shopgirl appeared in the midst of controversies over sexual morality and the pleasures and dangers of London itself. Sanders explores the shopgirl's centrality to modern conceptions of fantasy, desire, and everyday life for working women and argues for her as a key figure in cultural and social histories of the period. This study will appeal to scholars, students, and enthusiasts of Victorian and Edwardian life and literature."--BOOK JACKET.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: Constructing the shopgirl : the politics of everyday life; title: Figuring the female body : labor, sex, and desire in the department store; title: The failures of the romance : boredom and the production of consuming desires; title: Imagining alternatives to the romance: absorption and distraction as modes of reading; title: Distracted pleasures: gender, leisure, and consuming in public.