Bodies in Play: Female Athleticism in Nineteenth-Century Literature
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University of South Carolina Scholar Commons Theses and Dissertations 2018 Bodies In Play: Female Athleticism In Nineteenth- Century Literature Jillian Weber University of South Carolina Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarcommons.sc.edu/etd Part of the English Language and Literature Commons Recommended Citation Weber, J.(2018). Bodies In Play: Female Athleticism In Nineteenth-Century Literature. (Doctoral dissertation). Retrieved from https://scholarcommons.sc.edu/etd/4786 This Open Access Dissertation is brought to you by Scholar Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Scholar Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. BODIES IN PLAY: FEMALE ATHLETICISM IN NINETEENTH-CENTURY LITERATURE by Jillian Weber Bachelor of Arts University of Illinois, 2009 Master of Arts University of South Carolina, 2013 Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in English College of Arts and Sciences University of South Carolina 2018 Accepted by: Leon Jackson, Major Professor Catherine Keyser, Major Professor Cynthia Davis, Committee Member Katherine Adams, Committee Member Cheryl L. Addy, Vice Provost and Dean of the Graduate School © Copyright by Jillian Weber, 2018 All Rights Reserved. ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I am grateful to the University of South Carolina, the Institute for African American Research, and the Bilinski Educational Foundation for generously funding me through a Presidential Fellowship, a SPARC grant, an IAAR fellowship, and a Bilisnki Fellowship. This funding made it possible to complete my research and finish my dissertation. Without the generosity, patience, advice, and guidance, of Cat Keyser, Leon Jackson, Cynthia Davis, and Kate Adams, this dissertation would have never come to fruition. Their insight and kindness were invaluable, and I am so appreciative to have had them in my corner. The love and support of my family, particularly my parents, propelled me to keep working, even when I felt like I could not. They encouraged me every step of the way and I am eternally grateful for them. My brothers made me laugh when I was taking myself too seriously, and my grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins always cheered me on. My friends were my constant source of humor and support. They let me bounce ideas off of them and they made me laugh when it was most needed. I am indebted to the people, too many to name, who have positively affected my life over the past several years. I am lucky to know you all. iii ABSTRACT My dissertation explores depictions of athletic female characters in nineteenth- century American literature. I argue that there is a rich literary tradition of athletic women, whose origin I date to the 1840s, that has not been explored. To date, scholars have considered athletic women in literature anomalies, a case of a gender-bending female found in a single text, but not part of a longer genealogy of this character type. By examining athletic women over a period of decades and across several genres of American literature we see how this character type has been shaped by authors and culture alike. I illustrate how authors fashioned a character type that reflected the racial, political, and cultural moment in which he or she was writing. Simultaneously, athletic female embodiment reveals how texts themselves change when physical performance culture enters narratives. Athletic women, historically and in fiction, are linked to the theater and performance. Because athletic women were not taken seriously for their skills, they were looked at as simply entertainment; their sports were often relegated to theatrical spaces, such as stages during play intermissions. Authors recognized this connection between athletics and performance and utilized it to draw attention to the performativity of gender on the part of the female athlete. Athletic characters change their embodied performances based on context and audience, showing how women appropriated cultural scripts through sport. Ultimately, in nineteenth and early twentieth century literature, play-acting and athleticism become entwined and athleticism becomes a method for self-invention. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgements ............................................................................................................ iii Abstract .............................................................................................................................. iv List of Figures .................................................................................................................... vi Chapter 1: Introduction ........................................................................................................1 Chapter 2 “Off Went Bonnet and Skirt:” Boxing and Prostitution in the Flash Press ...............................................................................26 Chapter 3 Bluestockings, Tomboys, and Literary Amazons in the Mid-Nineteenth Century .............................................................................75 Chapter 4 “The Steed that Never Tires:” Regionalism and Rupture in Cycling Narratives ............................................................................113 Chapter 5 “That Stirring Cry of Right Guard:” Athletics, Race, and Space in College Girl Novels ............................................................149 References ........................................................................................................................181 v LIST OF FIGURES Figure 2.1 “The Great Bloomer Prize Fight” .....................................................................72 Figure 3.1 Kiralfy Bros “Black Crook” .............................................................................76 Figure 4.1 Bicycling .........................................................................................................120 Figure 5.1 Jane Allen, Right Guard .................................................................................160 vi CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION In 1883, the New York Times published “Miss Harris’s Base-Ball Nine,” about an exhibition between two black female baseball teams in the Northeastern United States. It reads: A reporter of the Philadelphia Times to-day found a number of persons, white and black, lounging under the maples in the Lamokin Woods, when suddenly a dusky damsel, with a red and white jockey cap stuck upon her head, a short, tight-fitting pink and white sheeny calico dress enveloping her form, and a pair of cricket shoes on her feet, suddenly emerged upon the scene. (“Miss Harris”). The woman described here, Ella Harris, is the captain of the Dolly Vardens No. 1 baseball team.1 Immediately, the reader’s attention is directed towards Ella’s feminine body, as the reporter notes that she has a “ribbon suspended on [her] bosom.” She wears a short, tight dress that further accentuates her female form. However, she also carries “a base-ball bat over her right shoulder and she [strides] over the greensward with manly strides.” She then “shoulder[s] her bat” and “stalk[s] down through the maple glade.” While Ella’s movements are assertive and aligned with manliness, her clothing is “stuck upon her head” and “envelops” her (“Miss Harris”). The language used to describe her costume renders Ella submissive at the same time that her body is depicted as forceful. 1 Debra A. Shattuck gives a brief history of the Dolly Varden No. 1 and the Dolly Varden No. 2 teams in Bloomer Girls: Women Baseball Pioneers. See Chapter Four of Bloomer Girls for more background. 1 With nearly every action that she takes, Ella seems to combine femininity and masculinity in the way that she holds herself. As the article continues, it becomes clear that Ella Harris takes command of the gaze directed towards her by both onlookers and teammates. She also maintains steady control over the space of the field throughout the article. When Ella “[emerges] on the scene” she becomes the object of everybody’s attention, much like an actor walking onto a stage and captivating an audience. A “poorly dressed young colored woman” shouts, “Foh de Lord’s sake, am dat you, Ella Harris?” Ella ignores the question, refusing to either confirm or deny her identity, and monologues in a “long, theatrical aside” about the tardiness of the Dolly Vardens No. 2 team (“Miss Harris”). Then, to prepare for the game, Ella directs her players to stand in specific places and she cordons off space, using rope and the players’ bodies to mark the field. She sets the stage for the performance that is about to take place. Ella’s form-fitting Dolly Vardens costume, which already juxtaposes her female frame with her masculine comportment, also carries race and class implications. Not only does her jockey cap recall the tradition of black men, often former slaves, serving as jockeys in the nineteenth century, but the tight-fitting “pink and white sheeny…dress”2 mirrors a fashion trend from the 1870s—the Dolly Varden dress, so named for the white, upper-class, flirtatious woman in Charles Dickens’s Barnaby Rudge (1841).3 In other words, the way that Ella chooses to outfit herself puts the contradictions of her identity on display. Her uniform, coupled with her theatrical asides, create a dynamic version of Ella Harris that is difficult to pin down. 2 According to the Oxford English Dictionary, sheeny refers to something “having a bright, shiny surface” and was first used in the seventeenth century