| Description |
viii, 247 pages ; 24 cm |
| Contents |
Introduction: Myths of the Modern -- 1. Modernity and Feminism -- 2. On Nostalgia: The Prehistoric Woman -- 3. Imagined Pleasures: The Erotics and Aesthetics of Consumption -- 4. Masking Masculinity: The Feminization of Writing -- 5. Love, God, and the Orient: Reading the Popular Sublime -- 6. Visions of the New: Feminist Discourses of Evolution and Revolution -- 7. The Art of Perversion: Female Sadists and Male Cyborgs -- Afterword: Rewriting the Modern |
| Summary |
"In an innovative and invigorating exploration of the complex relations between women and the modern, Rita Felski challenges conventional male-centered theories of modernity. She also calls into question those feminist perspectives that have either demonized the modern as inherently patriarchal, or else assumed a simple opposition between men's and women's experiences of the modern world. Combining cultural history with cultural theory, and focusing on the fin de siècle, Felski examines the gendered meanings of such notions as nostalgia, consumption, feminine writing, the popular sublime, evolution, revolution, and perversion. Her approach is comparative and interdisciplinary, covering a wide variety of texts from the English, French, and German traditions: sociological theory, realist and naturalist novels, decadent literature, political essays and speeches, sexological discourse, and sentimental popular fiction. Male and female writers from Simmel, Zola, Sacher-Masoch, and Rachilde to Marie Corelli, Wilde, and Olive Schreiner come under Felski's scrutiny as she exposes the varied and often contradictory connections between femininity and modernity."--Publisher description |
| Analysis |
Feminism |
| Notes |
Includes index |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references (pages [213]-240) and index |
| SUBJECT |
Women & literature. http://id.loc.gov/authorities/names/n42026678
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| Subject |
Women and literature.
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Feminist theory.
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Civilization, Modern -- 19th century.
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Civilization, Modern -- 20th century.
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Women in literature.
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Feminist criticism.
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| LC no. |
94044329 |
| ISBN |
0674341937 alkaline paper |
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0674341945 paperback alkaline paper |
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