Woman and the Demon: The Life of a Victorian Myth

by Nina Auerbach

Book Overview

Here is a bold new vision of Victorian culture: a study of myths of womanhood that shatters the usual generalizations about the squeezed, crushed, and ego-less Victorian woman.

Through copious examples drawn from literature, art, and biography, Nina Auerbach reconstructs three central paradigms: the angel/demon, the old maid, and the fallen woman. She shows how these animate a pervasive Victorian vision of a mobile female outcast with divine...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0674954076
• ISBN13: 9780674954076
• Release Date: January 1984
• Publisher: Harvard University Press
• Length: 272 Pages
• Weight: 0.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 6.0" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

An excellent Essay

Ms. Auerbach takes the reader back to the Victorian ages through the medias of art and literature to examine the image of the female during the period. She portrays the image of the female as "Mythic" - that is, as very broad and also very powerful, effecting the entire age and the ages to come. She discusses such works as Svengali, The New Magdalen, and the artistic works of Rossetti. Her thesis is basically that during the Victorian Era there was a sort of "crisis of faith," and the image of the woman stepped up to replace the ideas held by religions, thereby becoming angelic or demonic. The book is well written, thought provoking and informitive in its presentation.