In recent years the analysis of the intersection of literature
and economics has generated a vibrant conversation in literary and
cultural studies of the Victorian period. But Aeron Hunt argues
that an emphasis on abstraction and impersonality as the crucial
features of the Victorian economic experience has led to a partial
and ultimately misleading vision of Victorian business culture. In
contrast, she asserts that the key to understanding the
relationship of literary writing to economic experience is what she
calls "personal business"--the social and interpersonal
relationships of Victorian commercial life in which character was a
central mediating concept.
Juxtaposing novels by Charles Dickens, George Eliot, and
Margaret Oliphant with such nonfiction works as popular
biographies, periodicals, and business handbooks, the author builds
on and extends the insights of the "new economic criticism" by
highlighting the embodied, interpersonal, and socially embedded
interactions of everyday economic life.
Hunt analyzes the productive and disciplinary roles that
character played in the Victorian economy and traces the
proliferation of different models of character as literary writing
and commercial discourse responded to the challenges and
opportunities presented by personal business. She suggests that the
dynamic interchange between forms of character employed in the
everyday practice of business and those imagined in literary
writing helped shape character as a crucial mode of power in
Victorian business culture and economic life. Ultimately, "Personal
Business" provides new ways to understand both the history of the
Victorian novel and its implications in middle-class culture and
the turbulent experience of nineteenth-century capitalism.
General
Imprint: |
University of Virginia Press
|
Country of origin: |
United States |
Series: |
Victorian Literature and Culture Series |
Release date: |
September 2014 |
First published: |
October 2014 |
Authors: |
Aeron Hunt
|
Dimensions: |
235 x 156 x 22mm (L x W x T) |
Format: |
Hardcover - Cloth over boards
|
Pages: |
240 |
ISBN-13: |
978-0-8139-3631-4 |
Categories: |
Books
|
LSN: |
0-8139-3631-4 |
Barcode: |
9780813936314 |
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