The Ends of History : Victorians and "the Woman Question"

Omtale

Why were the Victorians so passionate about "History"? How did this passion relate to another Victorian obsession ? the "woman question"? In a brilliant and provocative study, Christina Crosby investigates the links between the Victorians? fascination with "history" and with the nature of "women." Discussing both key novels and non-literary texts ? Daniel Deronda and Hegel?s Philosophy of History; Henry Esmond and Macaulay?s History of England; Little Dorrit, Wilkie Collins? The Frozen Deep, and Mayhew?s survey of "labour and the poor"; Villette, Patrick Fairburn?s The Typology of Scripture and Ruskin?s Modern Painters ? she argues that the construction of middle-class Victorian "man" as the universal subject of history entailed the identification of "women" as those who are before, beyond, above, or below history. Crosby?s analysis raises a crucial question for today?s feminists ? how can one read historically without replicating the problem of nineteenth century "history"? The book was first published in 1991.