Dickens and the Despised Mother

A Critical Reading of Three Autobiographical Novels

Nonfiction, Social & Cultural Studies, Social Science, Gender Studies, Women&, Fiction & Literature, Literary Theory & Criticism
Cover of the book Dickens and the Despised Mother by Shale Preston, McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers
View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart
Author: Shale Preston ISBN: 9780786493319
Publisher: McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers Publication: January 8, 2013
Imprint: Language: English
Author: Shale Preston
ISBN: 9780786493319
Publisher: McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers
Publication: January 8, 2013
Imprint:
Language: English

This work offers an original interpretation of the mothers of the protagonists in Dickens’s autobiographical novels. Taking Julia Kristeva’s psychoanalytic concept of abjection and Mary Douglas’s anthropological analysis of pollution as its conceptual framework, the book argues that Dickens’s primary emotional response towards the mother who abandoned him to work in a blacking warehouse was disgust, and suggests that we can trace similar signs of disgust in the narrators of his fictional autobiographies, David Copperfield, Bleak House, and Great Expectations. The author provides a close reading of Dickens’s autobiographical fragment and opens up the possibility that Dickens’s feelings towards his mother actually bore a significant influence on his fiction. The book closes with a provocative discussion of Dickens’s compulsive Sikes and Nancy public readings.

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

This work offers an original interpretation of the mothers of the protagonists in Dickens’s autobiographical novels. Taking Julia Kristeva’s psychoanalytic concept of abjection and Mary Douglas’s anthropological analysis of pollution as its conceptual framework, the book argues that Dickens’s primary emotional response towards the mother who abandoned him to work in a blacking warehouse was disgust, and suggests that we can trace similar signs of disgust in the narrators of his fictional autobiographies, David Copperfield, Bleak House, and Great Expectations. The author provides a close reading of Dickens’s autobiographical fragment and opens up the possibility that Dickens’s feelings towards his mother actually bore a significant influence on his fiction. The book closes with a provocative discussion of Dickens’s compulsive Sikes and Nancy public readings.

More books from McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers

Cover of the book Bud Fowler by Shale Preston
Cover of the book Pennsylvanian Voices of the Great War by Shale Preston
Cover of the book RKO Radio Pictures Horror, Science Fiction and Fantasy Films, 1929-1956 by Shale Preston
Cover of the book The Man Who Made the Jailhouse Rock by Shale Preston
Cover of the book Black Baseball in New York City by Shale Preston
Cover of the book The Chivalric Romance and the Essence of Fiction by Shale Preston
Cover of the book Reading the Middle Ages by Shale Preston
Cover of the book Vic and Sade on the Radio by Shale Preston
Cover of the book Marjorie Main by Shale Preston
Cover of the book At Home in the Whedonverse by Shale Preston
Cover of the book Eleven Bravo by Shale Preston
Cover of the book Australian Crime Fiction by Shale Preston
Cover of the book Tappin' at the Apollo by Shale Preston
Cover of the book Women Opera Composers by Shale Preston
Cover of the book Margaret O'Brien by Shale Preston
We use our own "cookies" and third party cookies to improve services and to see statistical information. By using this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy