{"id":507,"date":"2020-09-18T17:09:42","date_gmt":"2020-09-18T17:09:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/?p=507"},"modified":"2020-09-18T17:09:42","modified_gmt":"2020-09-18T17:09:42","slug":"the-role-of-motherhood-in-the-19th-century-novel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/2020\/09\/18\/the-role-of-motherhood-in-the-19th-century-novel\/","title":{"rendered":"The role of Motherhood in the 19th century novel"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Why do so many novels of the 19<sup>th<\/sup> century diminish the role of motherhood?\u00a0 For Dickins, why are the mothers frequently absent (<u>Dombey and Son<\/u>, <u>Great Expectations<\/u>, <u>Oliver Twist<\/u>)?\u00a0 For Jane Austin, the mothers are largely just silly or decorative (<u>Pride &amp; Prejudice<\/u>, <u>Mansfield Park<\/u>).\u00a0 What does their absence or inadequacy imply?\u00a0 It is also interesting to note who, if anyone, is filling that role in the respective novels.\u00a0 In <u>Daisy Miller<\/u>, it partially falls to the courier, and the consequences are fatal.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Exploring more deeply the role of motherhood in <u>Daisy Miller<\/u>, James would seem to be implying that the figure is absent, negligible, ineffective, insignificant.\u00a0 As Dames reports in his excerpt <u>A Concise Companion to the Victorian Novel<\/u>:\u00a0 \u201cA common enough moment in Victorian fiction \u2013 the introductory portrait of a character \u2013 here relies on the meaningfulness of facial characteristics, their capacity to unveil the workings of a personality\u201d (Dames p. 101). \u00a0James introduces Daisy\u2019s mother using adjectives which describe her non-entity:\u00a0 \u201c<em>Her mother was a small, spare, light person, with a wandering eye, a very exiguous nose<\/em>\u201d.\u00a0 Even her physical introduction is covered in nuances of her insignificance <em>\u201cThe figure of a lady appeared, at a distance, very indistinct, \u2026 with a slow and wavering movement\u201d<\/em>\u2026\u201d (p. 22) <em>the lady in question hovered vaguely about the spot<\/em>\u201d.\u00a0 James uses adjectives or adverbs to describe her as a shadow, her lack of presence, her deficiencies as a parent.\u00a0 Her hair is thin and \u201cfrizzled\u201d rather than \u201ccurly\u201d which other than being pejorative implies burned or ruined.\u00a0 This is not an attractive image of a role model for Daisy.\u00a0 Finally, he uses very strong language in the last chapter when he writes \u201cMrs. Miller was invisible.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>But what if James is actually implying the reverse: that the absence of a strong figure in the role of motherhood is damaging to her children\u2019s growth and ultimately could have fatal consequences?\u00a0 Mrs. Miller\u2019s social invisibility in the last chapter is due to her bedside presence with her sick daughter.\u00a0 James is then saying that her daughter is advantaged by her mother\u2019s presence.\u00a0 Tracing this back throughout the novel, the absence of adequate and effective guidance from her mother has repeated negative consequences for Daisy and ultimately results in her tragic death.\u00a0 James would thereby seem to be indirectly expounding the importance of motherhood in forming and rearing children.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Why do so many novels of the 19th century diminish the role of motherhood?\u00a0 For Dickins, why are the mothers frequently absent (Dombey and Son, Great Expectations, Oliver Twist)?\u00a0 For Jane Austin, the mothers are largely just silly or decorative (Pride &amp; Prejudice, Mansfield Park).\u00a0 What does their absence or inadequacy imply?\u00a0 It is also &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/2020\/09\/18\/the-role-of-motherhood-in-the-19th-century-novel\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">The role of Motherhood in the 19th century novel<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4449,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[138877],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-507","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fall-2020"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/507","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4449"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=507"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/507\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=507"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=507"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=507"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}