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Victorian Feeling and the Victorian Novel
Author(s) -
Ablow Rachel
Publication year - 2007
Publication title -
literature compass
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.158
H-Index - 4
ISSN - 1741-4113
DOI - 10.1111/j.1741-4113.2006.00405.x
Subject(s) - historicity (philosophy) , skepticism , ideology , feeling , context (archaeology) , value (mathematics) , psychology , literature , aesthetics , state (computer science) , history , sociology , epistemology , social psychology , philosophy , art , law , political science , computer science , politics , archaeology , algorithm , machine learning
This article examines the recent explosion of interest in the emotions in the context of the Victorian novel. It focuses specifically on work published since the “theoretical turn” of the 1970s, describing how recent feminist critics have expanded the range of texts we examine and questioned the value we grant or refuse to sentimental literature, how Foucauldian critics have called attention to the historicity of the emotions, and how post‐Althusserian critics have redefined literature as an Ideological State Apparatus. The result has been a renewed interest in – as well as a new skepticism about – emotional responses to literary texts.