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dc.contributor.authorWynne, Deborah*
dc.date.accessioned2016-03-30T09:14:33Zen
dc.date.available2016-03-30T09:14:33Zen
dc.date.issued2008-04-01en
dc.identifier.citationWynne, D. (2008). Equivocal objects: The problems of property in Daniel Deronda. 19: Interdisciplinary Studies in the Long Nineteenth Century, (6). http://doi.org/10.16995/ntn.473en
dc.identifier.doihttp://doi.org/10.16995/ntn.473en
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/10034/603959en
dc.description.abstractWritten between the passing of the first Married Women's Property Act in 1870 and the second Act of 1882, Eliot's final novel, Daniel Deronda (1876), offers a powerful depiction of the social and legal disabilities faced by women. Her representations of objects and objectification centre on the concept of property, not only portable property such as jewellery and clothing, but also the idea of women themselves as property to be exchanged within the Victorian social system. This essay suggests that Eliot's awareness of the anomalies of the law and the equivocal positions held by women in terms of property ownership informs her depictions of the things women possess, and the sorts of meanings generated by objects. The essay argues that in Daniel Deronda Eliot offers a powerful critique of women's exclusion from the patriarchal processes of primogeniture, and that her ironic use of terms such as 'own' and 'self-possession' in relation to her female characters helps to emphasise her need to move beyond the heroine who renounces the things of this world.
dc.description.sponsorshipAHRC Research Leave Grant AH/G002940/1en
dc.language.isoenen
dc.publisherOpen Library of Humanitiesen
dc.relation.urlhttp://www.19.bbk.ac.uk/articles/abstract/10.16995/ntn.473/en
dc.subjectGeorge Elioten
dc.subjectVictorian womenen
dc.subjectpropertyen
dc.subjectDaniel Derondaen
dc.title‘Equivocal Objects: The Problems of Property in Daniel Deronda’en
dc.typeArticleen
dc.identifier.eissn1755-1560en
dc.contributor.departmentUniversity of Chesteren
dc.identifier.journal19: Interdisciplinary Studies in the Long Nineteenth Centuryen
html.description.abstractWritten between the passing of the first Married Women's Property Act in 1870 and the second Act of 1882, Eliot's final novel, Daniel Deronda (1876), offers a powerful depiction of the social and legal disabilities faced by women. Her representations of objects and objectification centre on the concept of property, not only portable property such as jewellery and clothing, but also the idea of women themselves as property to be exchanged within the Victorian social system. This essay suggests that Eliot's awareness of the anomalies of the law and the equivocal positions held by women in terms of property ownership informs her depictions of the things women possess, and the sorts of meanings generated by objects. The essay argues that in Daniel Deronda Eliot offers a powerful critique of women's exclusion from the patriarchal processes of primogeniture, and that her ironic use of terms such as 'own' and 'self-possession' in relation to her female characters helps to emphasise her need to move beyond the heroine who renounces the things of this world.


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