{"product_id":"fictions-of-modesty-women-and-courtship-in-the-english-novel-9780226950969","title":"Fictions of Modesty: Women and Courtship in the English Novel","description":"\u003cp\u003eFrom the late seventeenth century to the beginning of the twentieth  no figure was more central to debates in England about the relations between the sexes than that of the modest woman. Drawing on a wide range of narratives from the period  Ruth Bernard Yeazell analyzes the multiple and conflicting wishes that were covered by talk of \"modesty\" and explores some of the most striking uses of a modest heroine.  Combining evidence from conduct books and ladies magazines with the arguments of influential theorists like Hume  Rousseau  and Wollstonecraft  this book begins by asking why writers were devoted to the anxious remaking of womens \"nature\" and to codifying rules for their porper behavior. Fictions of Modesty shows how the culture at once tried to regulate young womens desires and effectively opened up new possibilities of subjectivity and individual choice.  Yeazell goes on to demonstrate that modest delaying actions inform a central tradition of English narrative. On the Continent  the English believed  the jeune fille went from the artificial innocence of the convent to an arranged marriage and adultery; the natural modesty of the Englishwoman  however  enabled her to choose her own mate and to marry both prudently and with affection. Rather than taking its narrative impetus from adultery  then  English fiction concentrated on courtship and the consciousness of the young woman choosing. After paired studies of Richardsons Pamela and Clelands Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure (even Fanny Hill  Yeazell argues  is a modest English heroine at heart)  Yeazell investigates what women novelists made of the virtues of modesty in works by Burney  Austen  Charlotte Bronte  and Gaskell.  A speculative postscript briefly addresses the discourse of late nineteenth-century science in order to show how Darwins theory of sexual selection and Havelock Elliss psychology of sex replicate fictions of female modesty. While those who sought to codify modest behavior in previous centuries often appealed to Nature for support  our modern understanding of the natural  Yeazell suggests  owes something to the work of the novelists.  Sharply reasoned and witty  Fictions of Modesty will appeal to all those interested in womens studies  the English novel  and the continuing history of relations between the sexes.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"My Store","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":45276686090293,"sku":"ByrdShop_0226950964","price":334.5,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0627\/8139\/0901\/files\/9780226950969.jpg?v=1780560374","url":"https:\/\/atxbooks.com\/products\/fictions-of-modesty-women-and-courtship-in-the-english-novel-9780226950969","provider":"ATX Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}