{"id":2071,"date":"2025-02-19T03:06:13","date_gmt":"2025-02-19T03:06:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/?p=2071"},"modified":"2025-02-20T15:58:46","modified_gmt":"2025-02-20T15:58:46","slug":"financial-imperialism-and-the-men-of-the-women-in-white","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/2025\/02\/19\/financial-imperialism-and-the-men-of-the-women-in-white\/","title":{"rendered":"Financial Imperialism and Men in “The Woman in White”"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cWhat does informal empire mean?\u201d Jessie Reeder\u2019s essay illuminating the paradox inherent in informal empire brings to his reader\u2019s attention that the agents of empire, while invading lands they have no ownership over in quest for wealth, often do so without the awareness that they are \u201c\u2018missionaries of capitalism\u2019 and the \u2018capitalist vanguard\u2019\u201d (Reeder, 432). Indeed, another definition for \u201cinformal empire,\u201d he informs us, is \u201cfinancial imperialism\u201d (431). Freed from the hierarchies demanded by the supervision of centralized power, \u201cmost individuals simply followed their own individual, rather than any large systemic, motivations\u201d (432). The key word here is most<\/em>.<\/p>\n

In The Women in White<\/em>, both Count Fosco and Sir Percival Glyde operate as agents of informal empire, aiming to gain financial control over Laura Glyde n\u00e9e Fairlie. They do so outside of structured, hierarchal power dynamics: in this setting, that is the Glyde\u2019s marriage and Count Fosco\u2019s dominance over the takeover. Additionally, Count Fosco is himself a foreigner, and is entering not only onto English territory but specifically Laura and Percival\u2019s territory, in order to enact \u201ca system of coercive power\u201d (432). Both Percival and the Count are aware of their actions and their financial desire, and both are enacting nefarious works to obtain their desires; however, where Percival strives to do so within the bounds of his marriage with Laura \u2013 when he is trying to convince her to sign the mysterious document: \u201cI have told her this is merely a formal document \u2013 and what more can she want? You may say what you please; but it is no part of a woman\u2019s duty to set her husband at defiance.\u201d (Collins, 246) \u2013 Count Fosco exerts control over Percival himself, the sending and receiving of mail, the animals and people surrounding him, and the health of the people around him. Some scholars, Reeder informs us, reject the term \u201cinformal empire,\u201d and instead suggest \u201cthat \u2018sphere of influence\u2019 or \u2018dependency\u2019 better fits the bill\u201d (Reeder, 433). Both Fosco and Percival foster exert their influence to encourage dependency in others, often by using their status, in their effort to pursue their individual desires for first financial freedom, and then financial control. Walter and Mariane, upon their reunion, understand that \u201c[they] had no mercy to expect from Count Fosco and Sir Percival Glyde. The success of the conspiracy had brought with it a clear gain to those two men of thirty thousand pounds \u2013 twenty thousand to one: ten thousand to the other\u201d (Collins, 431).<\/p>\n

In direct opposition to Percival and Count Fosco, Walter Hartright embodies the unaware vessel for informal imperialism within the novel. Whereas Fosco and Percival are actively participating in their desire for financial domination, Hartright leaves England to escape from his ill-begotten love for the then-Laura Fairlie. To do so, he joins an expedition to Central America, to \u201cmake excavations among the ruined cities\u201d (178). While it is unclear exactly what is happening during his time away, it can be assumed that the excavations he is joining are in the interest of financial gain \u2013 if not for the individual, then for the empire. However, it is clear that upon his return to England, he has not netted financial gain from the expedition. Although he returns \u201ca changed man,\u201d the money he contributes to his and Mariane\u2019s fund is only \u201cthe purchase-money obtained from the sale by the sale of [his] drawing master\u2019s practice before [he] left England\u201d (406; 432). Later, when Walter meets with Mr. Kyrle, he refuses to discuss Laura\u2019s affairs with him and tells him \u201cThere shall be no money-motive\u2026no idea of personal advantage, in the service I mean to render to Lady Glyde\u201d (445). Although Walter can\u2019t count himself among the individuals intentionally participating in the financial imperialism happening within the novel, and indeed flat-out denies wanting to, he is still complicit in it through his vague expedition to Central America \u2013 he faces death by \u201cdisease,\u201d \u201cIndians,\u201d and \u201cdrowning\u201d \u2013 and, I theorize, his involvement with Mariane and Laura. Although we have yet to read about it in the novel, I wonder the ways in which Walter Hartright will experience the benefit of his informal imperialism, just by virtue of being among the men intruding into Mariane and Laura\u2019s lives.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cWhat does informal empire mean?\u201d Jessie Reeder\u2019s essay illuminating the paradox inherent in informal empire brings to his reader\u2019s attention that the agents of empire, while invading lands they have no ownership over in quest for wealth, often do so without the awareness that they are \u201c\u2018missionaries of capitalism\u2019 and the \u2018capitalist vanguard\u2019\u201d (Reeder, 432). … Continue reading Financial Imperialism and Men in “The Woman in White”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5320,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[135984],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2071","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2025-posts"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2071","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5320"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2071"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2071\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2071"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2071"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2071"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}