Wounds and Words: Childhood and Family Trauma in Romantic and Postmodern FictionTrauma has become a hotly contested topic in literary studies. But interest in trauma is not new; its roots extend to the Romantic period, when novelists and the first psychiatrists influenced each others' investigations of the »wounded mind«. This book looks back to these early attempts to understand trauma, reading a selection of Romantic novels in dialogue with Romantic and contemporary psychiatry. It then carries that dialogue forward to postmodern fiction, examining further how empirical approaches can deepen our theorizations of trauma. Within an interdisciplinary framework, this study reveals fresh insights into the poetics, politics, and ethics of trauma fiction. |
Contents
| 7 | |
| 9 | |
Theorizing Trauma Romantic and Postmodern Perspectives on Mental Wounds | 27 |
The Wounded Mind Feminism Trauma and SelfNarration in Mary Wollstonecrafts The Wrongs of Woman | 87 |
Anatomizing the Demons of HatredTraumatic Loss and Mental Illness in William Godwins Mandeville ... | 127 |
A Tragedy of Incest Trauma Identity and Performativity in Mary Shelleys Mathilda ... | 163 |
Polluted Daughters Incestuous Abuse and the Postmodern Tragic in Jane Smileys A Thousand Acres ... | 203 |
Inheriting Trauma Family Bonds and Memory Ties in Anne Michaelss Fugitive Pieces ... | 241 |
The Body of Evidence Family History Guilt and Recovery in Trezza Azzopardis The Hiding Place | 279 |
Conclusion | 315 |
| 323 | |
Other editions - View all
Wounds and Words: Childhood and Family Trauma in Romantic and Postmodern Fiction Christa Schönfelder No preview available - 2014 |
Common terms and phrases
abuse approach asserts attempt becomes body calls caused chapter child childhood claims close complex concerns connection context contrast critical crucial cultural daughter death depiction describes desire discourses discussion Dolores effects emotional emphasizes especially ethical example experiences explores expresses fact father feel female fiction figures finally forces Fugitive Pieces functions further Ginny Godwin’s guilt hand Hiding highlights human idea identity impact important incest individual issues Jakob Jemima kind literary loss madness Mandeville Mandeville’s Maria Mathilda means memory mental mind moral mother narration narrative notion novel novella parents particularly passions past performative physical Place political postmodern powerful processes psychiatric psychological questions recovery regarding relation relationship represents resonates response Romantic scene seems sense Shelley’s shift sisters social specific story stress structures studies suffering suggests tends tion trauma trauma fiction turn victims Wollstonecraft wound writing Wrongs of Woman