Here is a bold new vision of Victorianculture: a study of myths of womanhoodthat shatters the usual generalizationsabout the squeezed, crushed, and ego-less Victorian woman.
Through copious examples drawn fromliterature, art, and biography, Auerbachreconstructs three central paradigms: the angel/demon, the old maid, and thefallen woman. She shows how these animate a pervasive Victorian vision of amobile female outcast with divine anddemonic powers. Fear of such disruptive, self-creating figures...