October 2018 Newsletter Issue 18.2

Welcome to the latest issue of your BAVS Newsletter. In this BAVS Executive Web & Publicity issue, you can find details about the 2018 BAVS Talks, our President Officers now-annual series of filmed lectures by leading figures in Dinah Birch Will Abberley Victorian Studies, as well as a plethora of reviews, news Claire Wood about the latest publications and reports from recent events Past President run by BAVS members. Hilary Fraser ECR Representatives

Jen Baker It was a real pleasure for everyone on the Committee to see Secretary Catherine Han those who were able to come to the excellent BAVS Patricia Pulham Conference in Exeter this August. The conference Careers Representative organisers – led by Patricia Zakreski and Kate Newey – did Treasurer Sarah Parker a wonderful job in putting together a stimulating Emma Butcher programme, memorable entertainments, and creating a convivial, welcoming atmosphere for all delegates. You’ll be European able to read more about the conference in the next issue of Membership Secretary Representative the Newsletter, and we’re already looking forward to Claudia Capancioni Dany Van Dam heading to Dundee for BAVS 2020! Assistant Membership Postgraduate We’ve had some changes to the BAVS Committee this Secretary Representatives summer, including welcoming a number of new ordinary Briony Wickes Heather Hind members, as well as Jonathan Memel as the Newsletter’s Danielle Dove Reviews Editor, and two new postgraduate representatives: Funding Officer Heather Hind and Danielle Dove. Hilary Fraser’s very Amelia Yeates Ordinary Members successful term as BAVS President has also come to an end. Charlotte Boyce Hilary has been a wonderfully generous, engaged and Communications Officer Carolyn Burdett engaging President whose influence on BAVS will be felt for Alexandra Lewis Alice Crossley years to come. We’re delighted, though, to welcome our new Regenia Gagnier President, Dinah Birch, and we’re all looking forward to Newsletter Editor Ann Heilmann working alongside her in the coming years to carry on Joanna Taylor Elisabeth Jay developing BAVS. As ever, if there’s anything you feel the Rohan McWilliam BAVS Committee should be addressing, do get in touch with Reviews Editor Rosemary Mitchell one us. Our contact details are on the website. Jonathan Memel Kate Newey

Adrian Wisnicki Until then, happy reading! Conference Organiser: Tricia Zakreski

Kirstie Blair Joanna Taylor Newsletter Editor

CONTENTS ANNOUNCEMENTS 2 R EVIEWS 19

CONFERENCE REPORTS 4 RECENT PUBLICATIONS 24

OTHER EVENTS 12 CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS 35 (PRINT) BAVS FUNDING REPORTS 15 CALL FOR PAPERS 36 (CONFERENCES)

Announcements

BAVS Talks 2018

Subtitled videos of the BAVS Talks 2018 are available on the BAVS website: https://bavs.ac.uk/videos/

This year’s BAVS Talks featured:

• Caroline Arscot, ‘Victorian Art and Science’ • Kirstie Blair, ‘Scotland, the Four Nations, and Victorian Studies’ • Miles Taylor, ‘Rethinking Queen Victoria’ • Bennett Zon, ‘Victorian Musicology as Interdiscipline’

You can also find previous years’ talks on the website.

RÊVE: Romantic Europe: The Virtual Exhibition

RÊVE: Romantic Europe: The Virtual Exhibition is an exciting interdisciplinary online project which brings together Romantic objects, places and texts from across Europe in a series of blog posts dedicated to exploring Romanticism's transnational perspectives. Recent and upcoming posts include 'A Mourning Dress brought back from Tahiti by Captain James Cook' by Prof. Dr. Barbara Schaff (The University of Göttingen), 'Two pages from Dorothy Wordsworth’s Grasmere Journal' by Jeff Cowton (Curator, The Wordsworth Trust) and 'Fingal’s Cave' by Prof. Nigel Leask (University of Glasgow). ‘Frog Service’ dish, V&A

Explore the latest on show at: http://www.euromanticism.org/virtual-exhibition/

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Tennyson Conference, Christ Church, Oxford, 29 – 31 March 2019

The Tennyson Society’s 2019 conference will be hosted at Christ Church – the college of Henry Hallam and of William Gladstone, who was instrumental in securing Tennyson’s peerage. The college has a rich literary history, including links to W. H. Auden and to Lewis Carroll, collections of whose manuscripts are kept in the Upper Library. Founded in 1546, Christ Church is home to Oxford’s cathedral and houses a picture gallery, whose permanent collection includes paintings by Filippino Lippi, Tintoretto, Anthony van Dyck, and Frans Hals.

The conference will include four keynote lectures, by Professor Michael O’Neill (Durham), Professor Leonée Ormond (King’s College, London), Professor Seamus Perry (Oxford), and Dr Jane Wright (Bristol). Their lectures will be accompanied by panels of twenty-minute papers on topics relating to Tennyson’s works, reception, and literary circle.

Further details are available on the Society’s website, or from [email protected]

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Conference Reports

BAVS is committed to supporting the activities of members, including conferences and events. Below are some of the recent events and research projects which have benefitted from BAVS Funding. For more information on BAVS events funding, please e-mail Amelia Yeates (BAVS Funding Officer: [email protected]) or go to: http://bavs.ac.uk/funding.

BAVS Careers Day University of Warwick 18 June 2018

I’m a third year PhD Student in English symposium offered a bounty of insights and Literature, based at the University of Exeter. insider tips on both academic and non- At the start of my third year I made the academic career paths. Firstly, the sessions decision to transfer to part time study on non-academic routes offered a making my deadline for submission October roundtable on transferable skills for non- 2019. I decided to transfer as I was finding it academic positions; a discussion of difficult to manage my PhD and my interests transferable skills, and a follow-on in teaching while also adapting my research workshop on identifying these skills. The working style for a recently diagnosed academic route offered a roundtable on dyslexia and dyspraxia. During my second applying for academic jobs; a discussion on year, I was sure I would not be interested in different types of funding and applications pursuing a career in academia due to the for different fellowships and a workshop heavy workloads of writing and research. identifying good and bad practice in grant However, as I start to write my final and fellowship applications. There was also chapters, and the PhD begins fitting together, a talk on pursing an academic career abroad. I am more and more interested in the idea of pursuing teaching fellowships or postdoc I chose to attend a mixture of the academic positions after my PhD. I mention my own and non-academic sessions. Firstly, I went to experience as I think that it highlights a the roundtable on adjacent and non- broad spectrum of general phases that every academic careers. This involved a discussion PhD student encounters. Undertaking the with Dr Louisa Yates, director of Gladstone’s extended project of research can come with Library; Dr Jess Roberts, a manager for the its ups and downs and, as it nears its end, can NHS education body HAELO; and Sean leave you feeling unsure about what you can Richardson, who is curating an exhibition on do, or more importantly want to do, after you E. M. Forster at the Dorking Museum and hand in. Heritage and Culture while completing his PhD at Nottingham Trent University. The This uncertainty about whether a non- panel was both light-hearted and inspiring academic or academic career route was right (a burst of humour and positivity that is for me was the reason I jumped at the chance needed when discussing the immense- to attend the first BAVS Careers Day. It did seeming leap into non-academic career not disappoint my expectations. The one-day paths!). Louisa, Jess and Sean shared a

4 wealth of experience: interview tips, C.V. on the back of a PhD in Victorian Studies. Her creating to stories of their entrepreneurism experience working for BBC Radio 3, and success. Their advice was simple: be collaborative projects within Parliament, proactive and creative and make publishing with both academic and non- opportunities for yourself. Work out how academic presses and dealing with the your passion can create opportunities to stresses and successes of freelance Post Doc engage with businesses and be proactive researcher work was inspiring. What shone about approaching these institutions. I found through even more was her positive and hearing about the ways in which they have persuasive tenacity. In a manner that was as presented their PhD experience in terms of friendly as it was shrewd, she conveyed her project management, and ‘doing’ words – belief in creating opportunities through developing, teaching, creating – to respecting others, appreciating every employers really helpful and helped me opportunity – no matter how unconnected to consider how I would rewrite a C.V. They her PhD in Suffragette theatre – and, most emphasised that many other sectors do not importantly, through learning to value – and have the insider knowledge about the invoice (!) – your time and effort as an diverse jobs a PhD student does every day independent researcher. Listening to all the and gave us ways of presenting research opportunities that Naomi has created for transferable skills in a multitude of different herself was humbling but also incredibly manners. I came away feeling very enabling. She demonstrated that so many enthusiastic and confident in my ability to opportunities can be created with passion create new and exciting opportunities for and persistence. myself following the PhD. A really nice touch was finishing the day with I then went to the discussion on applying for a session on mindfulness and mental health post-doc applications. It was really during the search for ECR opportunities and comforting to be taken through the different positions. Everyone we had met throughout types of fellowship and grant opportunities the day had been open and honest about the and awarding bodies available by Warwick’s difficulty of the sector and the scarcity of research strategy and development team. I positions. But more significantly, every talk had no idea that a fellowship is, for example, had focused on the importance of making the normally an individual application whereas right decisions for you, and of identifying the a grant is for a collaborative project. Dr opportunities that you wanted to create in Susannah Wilson shared her own experience your career. The talk from Warwick’s mental in being successful and unsuccessful for health co-ordinator was perfectly pitched to different fellowships. Overall, hearing from remind us all of the importance of setting the experience of people who review and go achievable goals and of not focusing on how through the postdoctoral experience made great others seemed to be doing, or letting me a lot more knowledgeable about a the failures turn into insurmountable process that I had known next to nothing mountains. Instead, learning to value and about before. understand what each of us can do as an individual and then a researcher was While all the talks were eye-opening and highlighted as the first step to being able to interesting, for me, the highlight of the day advertise our skills and passions to others. was the keynote lecture delivered by Naomi Paxton. I was such a pleasure to listen to Dr I’m very grateful to the BAVS Careers Day Paxton’s engaging and energy-filled tips for organisers for bringing together such an making non-conventional job opportunities inspiring day of talks. I really hope that the

5 opportunity is repeated and continues to while pursuing your goals and dealing with grow next year. insecurity and uncertainty. Jack Sargent (Exeter) I participated in the ‘Alternative Careers’ strand of the day, as I am currently ‘So what’s next?’ A question we have all considering looking for work beyond dreaded, especially when our PhD academia. Dr Paxton’s opening presentation submission is in sight, or we are approaching touched on many of the positive and the end of a short-term teaching or research negative aspects of working outside of our contract. Dr Naomi Paxton, keynote speaker academic comfort zones. Public engagement, at the BAVS Careers Day at the University of for example, helps you to reframe your Warwick, opened her talk considering this research for different audiences in tricky query and the problems it can pose for stimulating ways, but at the same time, you doctoral and early-career researchers. As Dr might quickly discover that other people will Catherine Han explained, when discussing come at your topic from surprising angles, the rationale for running the Careers Day quite apart from main focus of your topic. Dr with her collaborators Dr Jen Baker and Lucy Paxton passed on many great tips for Whitehead, knowing what to do next is very creating public engagement events, working rarely straightforward. with the media and maintaining a useful and healthy relationship with the various online According to data obtained by Vitae (the platforms available to PhD students and professional development programme ECRs. Although the negative discourse, supporting researchers), half of all doctoral particularly around career prospects, can graduates in the Arts and the Humanities in outweigh the positive discussions online the UK are working in sectors outside of (especially on Twitter), it is important to Higher Education within three years of maintain a human and humane presence. graduating. As Dr Han argued, we should see Even more crucially, Dr Paxton urged us not this spread of expertise and skills from the to be afraid to use social medial to promote academy into other spheres as a cause of ourselves and our work and to make fruitful celebration. On an individual level, however, professional connections. following an alternative path to traditional academic careers is often perceived as a Alternative or Adjacent Academic personal failure. Even though ECRs know Careers there are far more people with PhDs than there are permanent academic posts – it is The first session in the ‘Alternative Careers’ easy to believe that we weren’t dedicated strand was a roundtable discussion between enough, that we should have worked harder Dr Louisa Yates, the Director of Collections or been more brilliant. This is an unhelpful and Research at Gladstone’s Library and and unhealthy narrative, especially given the visiting lecturer at the University of rise in mental illness amongst doctoral Cheshire, Dr Jess Roberts, who moved from a researchers and academics at all stages of PhD in the Medical Humanities at the their career. The Careers Day, covered all of University of Salford to working for the NHS these important areas: how to put yourself in organisation Haleo who design and deliver the best position to get an academic post in improvement programmes for doctors and the UK or abroad, ways of exploring nurses, and Sean Richardson, a Doctoral alternative career paths, and how to take Researcher at Nottingham Trent University care of your mental and physical health who is working on a range of heritage and media projects alongside researching and

6 writing his thesis. One of the most important organisers Lucy Whitehead. It began with messages to come out of this session was some sobering statistics on incidences of that, for employers outside of academia, anxiety and depression amongst doctoral your PhD will only count for one line on your researchers in the Arts and Humanities. C.V. Beyond the academy, ‘doing a PhD’ is a Sarah talked about how common it was to mysterious concept and unless you can experience mental health issues during and articulate the skills, networks and after your PhD, particularly when you are knowledge you have built up, prospective dealing with uncertainties around where employers are not going to grasp your you will be working, where you might be potential. More encouragingly, the three living and financial insecurity. Sarah and speakers discussed how rewarding they Lucy talked about ways of maintaining a found their careers and certainly quashed feeling of control by compartmentalising the myth that having a PhD makes you your research and teaching, emphasising unemployable. how important it was to maintain a good work-life-balance in a culture that often How to Present Your Transferable Skills celebrates overwork. This was an honest and very necessary finish to a practical, positive The second and third sessions in the and highly organised training day. ‘Alternative Careers’ strand addressed the Katie Faulkner (The Courtauld Institute of issue of how to present the skills gained Art and Arcadia College of Global Studies) through your PhD to potential employers concisely, enthusiastically and confidently. In a workshop led by Charlie Cunningham London Victorian Studies Colloquium and Clare Halldron from the University of Royal Holloway Warwick Careers Service, participants learnt 13-14 April 2018 how to talk about the range of transferable competencies; we drew on difficult On Friday 13 and Saturday 14 April, the situations they had dealt with in the past. Royal Holloway Centre for Victorian Studies Charlie and Clare discussed the range of welcomed 35 postgraduate students and careers your PhD can lead you to and how to ECRs from institutions in the UK, Europe, the research potential careers and organisations USA and Canada for the annual London you might want to work for. We looked at the Victorian Studies Colloquium. This year’s key questions you should ask when colloquium addressed the theme of assessing a job advert, most importantly: ‘Interdisciplinarity and Impact in the Long What do I offer that this employer is looking Nineteenth Century’. Over the two days, for? What qualities or experience am I participants explored what those terms lacking? And why does this job appeal to me? meant to a variety of nineteenth-century It was a very practical and illuminating figures and organizations, and considered workshop, covering everything from more how early career researchers can increase traditional job searches to using LinkedIn the disciplinary breadth and impact of their and social media to network with potential own work. employers.

Friday began with a panel of excellent Mental Health and Wellbeing student papers on the theme of

‘Interdisciplinary Connections’. Laura The final plenary session was led by Sarah Francetti (Courtauld Institute) argued that Meharg, a Mental Health Coordinator at popular interest in thermodynamics and Warwick, in discussion with one of the event contemporary fears about the heat death of 7 the sun inspired Frederick Leighton’s refuse to remain confined within Flaming June; her presentation layered disciplinary silos. After the talk, delegates science and art to produce a revelatory new had time to take in the many Victorian reading of a well-known painting. Jeremy artworks held at Royal Holloway, before Newton (Birkbeck) introduced the dinner in the Founder’s Building. forgotten, yet incredibly popular playwright Henry Arthur Jones, exploring how Jones’s Saturday commenced with another panel of society dramas engaged with the excellent papers from PhD and ECR evolutionary biology of Herbert Spencer – delegates. Dr Ali Claire Flint (Derby) complete with a dramatic reading from one examined the multiple and material of Jones’s plays. Dominika Wielgopolan meanings in familial letters from a (Manchester Metropolitan) ended the panel Derbyshire gentry family. Flint suggested by giving an overview of John Ruskin’s that reading letters as merely text strips interdisciplinary career, before turning to away features that can alter their meaning, farming communities that were founded on from mourning borders to pressed flowers. Ruskinian principles, some of which still Helen-Frances Pilkington (Birkbeck) took survive, showing the impact of Victorian the theme of ‘impact’ quite literally, looking thought in the present day. at railway company seals from the National Railway Museum. She argued that these Then followed a talk by art historian, author seals sought to give a risky new endeavour a and historical consultant Dr Suzanne stamp of security through their imagery. Fagence Cooper, who gave an inspiring and Finally, Naomi Daw (Sussex) examined how honest account of the pleasures and Victorians became armchair tourists of difficulties of developing a portfolio career in Japan, exploring the country through Victorian Studies. While not sugar-coating stereoscope images. Daw analysed how the challenges of finding freelance work, these images structured power by placing Cooper reminded delegates that they have the viewer in different positions, and traded specialist skills and knowledge that people in an Orientalising vision of Japan and its should pay for, and not to give these away. A people. Together, these papers showed the particular highlight was her account of diversity of primary sources available to working on Ralph Fiennes’s film about Victorian Studies researchers, and how Dickens, The Invisible Woman (2013). overlooked texts and objects can help us write new cultural histories. Friday ended with a keynote from Professor Stephen Downes (Royal Holloway) on We then welcomed ECR Keynote speaker Dr “Sentimentalism and Music in the Victorian Matthew Sangster (Glasgow) for a talk on Salon (and beyond)” in the historic setting of ‘Locating the Literary in Romantic London’. Royal Holloway’s Picture Gallery. Downes Sangster talked through the process of argued against divides between the concert creating Romantic London, a website that hall symphony and sentimental pieces for offers digital maps of London and its the middle-class salon, illustrating how depictions in literature and guidebooks from performers and motifs crossed between the turn of the nineteenth-century. As a self- these spheres with the help of the Picture taught digital humanist, his talk showed how Gallery’s grand piano. Downes also showed digital humanities can be accessible for early that writers like Ruskin and artists including career researchers. In particular, his maps Leighton prized salon performance, creating revealed the limits of literary texts in fruitful connections with earlier talks, and depicting space: while guidebooks and reminding us that the Victorians we study directories ordered the increasingly

8 sprawling city of London, literary texts attendees was universally positive, with instead presented the city as a chaos that praise for the variety and quality of talks, and resisted representation. the mixed focus on new research, skills training, and careers advice. Delegates are Then followed two research training already planning to meet up again, and I look workshops, the first from Katie Fox of the forward to seeing the research and activities National Archives, and the second from Anna that they develop in the future. I would like White of the V&A. Fox explained the scope of to thank BAVS for the support that made the collections at the National Archives, and such a worthwhile event possible. its idiosyncratic cataloguing system by using Katie McGettigan (Royal Holloway) treasury records to find out the salary of a housemaid at the National Gallery in the 1890s, showing how government records Victorian and Neo-Victorian open windows into many aspects of Narratives of Crime and Punishment nineteenth-century life. White’s workshop Edinburgh Napier University invited students to analyse objects from the 27 April 2018 V&A – sadly only in photographic form! – and to think about what they tell us about the societies that produced and consumed them. One in a series of events marking the launch Covering objects that ranged from miniature of the Scottish Centre for Victorian and Neo- mosaics produced for tourists, to a plywood Victorian Studies (led by Professor Kirstie book from the Antarctic, White’s talk showed Blair at the University of Strathclyde), this the breadth of material culture, and how one-day conference proved to be a rich and studying Victorian objects can enhance work truly multi-disciplinary event, with across disciplines. delegates and presentations from the disciplines of law, literature, theatre studies, The colloquium ended with Dr Katie criminology and history. The successful McGettigan (Royal Holloway) speaking on integration of researchers at different stages ‘What is Impact and How do we Create it?’. of their career also received positive McGettigan outlined things to consider when feedback, with a panel on ‘New Approaches developing impact projects, and how to to Teaching Crime History’ – jointly measure impact. Students then worked in delivered by Liverpool John Moores groups to examine previous Impact Case lecturers Dr Emily Cuming and Dr Jude Studies, and come up with ideas for impact Piesse alongside three undergraduate projects drawing on their own research students – constituting one of the day’s around the themes of Science, highlights. Communications and Reform, Popular Cultures and Visual Cultures. The workshop The day began with parallel sessions on ‘Law illustrated the wide range of impact and Literature’ and ‘Neo-Victorian Fiction activities that can stem from Victorian and Material Culture’, with topics ranging Studies research, and emphasised the from ‘criminal plants’ in the Victorian importance of considering impact activities imagination to the material culture of crime when developing future research projects. in BBC’s Ripper Street. Dr Benjamin Poore’s Generous support from BAVS allowed us to (University of York) talk on ‘Sherlock as Post- award four travel bursaries to Ali Claire Imperial Adaptation’ was thought- Flint, Dominika Wielgopolan, Naomi Daw provoking, reading Benedict Cumberbatch’s and Anya Eastman, and to offset the cost of Sherlock as ‘white privilege and white attendance for all delegates. Feedback from fragility embodied’ and establishing links

9 between late-Victorian imperial thinking, Anxious Forms 2018: ‘Blood, Sweat, conspiracy theories and post-Brexit and Tears: Bodily Fluids in the Long xenophobia. Dr Graham Hogg, Curator at the Nineteenth Century’ National Library of Scotland, offered an Aston University, 27 July 2018 informative overview of the library’s resources on crime and punishment, It has oft been a stereotype that those living including its broadside collection. Dr Zoe during the long nineteenth century were Alker’s (University of Liverpool) rich talk on prudish to the point of self-disembodiment. ‘Digital Crime History and its Discontents’ Although more recent criticism has sought to charted out fascinating developments in undo this century-long cliché, ideas of the digital crime history, such as the Digital abject—in this instance, bodily fluids—still Panopticon seem conspicuously absent from both (https://www.digitalpanopticon.org/). Two primary texts of the long nineteenth century final parallel panels on ‘Criminal Urban and in much of the academic work about that Geographies’ and ‘The Ethics and Politics of period. The conference ‘Blood, Sweat, and Neo-Victorianism’ ranged from the role of Tears: Bodily Fluids in the Long Nineteenth the police surgeon in the nineteenth-century Century’ engaged with precisely such city to the criminal side of childhood in early perceived omissions. neo-Victorian fiction. Edinburgh Napier’s Avril Gray and MSc Publishing Student Kirsty BAVS’s generous contribution to the Andrews concluded the formal part of the conference budget went toward the travel programme with an overview of the and accommodation costs for the keynote University’s Big Read campaign, which this and plenary speakers. Professor Talia year featured Detective McLevy’s Casebook Schaffer (CUNY) opened the conference with by nineteenth-century Edinburgh detective a paper entitled ‘Fluid Reading: Subjectivity, James McLevy. Each delegate was given a Sentimentality, and Sociality’, which free copy to enjoy after the conference. interrogated emotion in nineteenth-century novels, focusing on ideas of tears, sentiment The day closed with a reception and moving and sympathy in theories of care. Professor performance of scenes from Martin Travers’ Schaffer also discussed the metaphorically Annville, based on Heather Spears’s novel ‘fluid’ ideas of community within these The Flourish, about two murders in Victorian theories of care. Plenary speaker Dr Kate Lanarkshire. The BAVS funding was used to part-finance the readings by actors Ryan Fletcher and Rosalind Sydney, and Martin Travers’ participation and preparation. The conference was co-sponsored by the University of Strathclyde, the Centre for Literature and Writing at Edinburgh Napier and the Scottish Centre for Crime and Justice Research. The event also saw lively coverage on Twitter under the conference hashtag #scvscrime.

The organisers would like to thank BAVS for supporting this event. Lois Burke, Helena Roots and Anne Schwan (Edinburgh Napier University)

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Lister (Leeds Trinity) gave a paper in the also traced how various paradigm shifts over afternoon session entitled ‘Buzzkill: The the long nineteenth century led to certain Victorians and the Vibrator’, which topics becoming more or less acceptable for discussed sexual fluids, hysteria, and the public consumption. And, perhaps most myths surrounding sexual repression, kink, significantly, several papers reported that and anxious illness in the long nineteenth certain bodily fluids were not considered as century. Dr Lister also brought to the taboo as a modern audience would have forefront many pertinent issues about them; authors instead recorded them in modern scholars who deal with still-taboo euphemistic or idiomatic language that has subjects and the ways in which the academy ceased to be fully recognised by the modern deals with them. reader.

The research presented by other delegates The conference was the third in the biennial covered a wide swathe of territory, with Anxious Forms conference series which papers on nineteenth-century stigmata, seeks, with every event, to interrogate a breastmilk, tears, ectoplasm, blood and different point of anxiety—overt or implied, heredity, syphilitic incontinence, blood addressed or ignored, contemporaneous or a magic and anthropology, menopause, later construction—in the literature and hormones, vomit, ‘night-soil’, and other culture of the long nineteenth century. The effluvia. Conference delegates were inaugural conference ‘Bodies in Crisis’ was especially successful in addressing why our held in 2014 and the second ‘Masculinities in current conception of the long nineteenth Crisis’ was in 2016; both were held at the century is so skewed in terms of bodily University of Glasgow, although this third function and excrescence. In part, the entry was held at Aston University in delegates debated how actual social, Birmingham to celebrate the opening of the scientific, or moral anxieties played a role in English Literature department (2017) and muffling certain conversations. Others found the History department (2018). that racial, class, and gender structures kept Abigail Boucher (Aston University) certain topics out of hegemonic—or at least the best recorded—discourses. Delegates

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Other Events

Women Writing Decadence: of a little-known work published as Vivien’s European Perspectives, 1880-1920 correspondence yet now considered to be a University of Oxford, 7-8 July 2018 novel that destabilises boundaries of gender and genre. As a touchstone for female decadents and an enabling force for depictions of same-sex love, Sappho featured in multiple papers and was a key consideration in Ellis Hanson’s (Cornell University) discussion of lesbian guides through decadent underworlds and Noelia Diaz-Vicedo’s (Queen Mary, University of London) exploration of Vivien’s use of the siren as facilitating a redefinition of gender identity.

The second keynote was delivered by Ana Parejo Vadillo (Birkbeck, University of London), which entailed a critique of Daniel Halévy’s 1959 biography of English decadent poet and biographer A. Mary F. Robinson. Acknowledging the polemical choices involved in constructing one’s subject for memorialisation, Vadillo reflected on Halévy’s decision to represent Robinson Featuring speakers from institutions through her correspondence with Maurice spanning twelve countries, ‘Women Writing Barrès. Turning to a discussion of Robinson’s Decadence’ is a clear testament to the biographical critical essays, Vadillo argued breadth of critical and literary recovery that that she purposefully used the language of has defined the quarter-century since the decadence as a shield against nationalistic publication of Elaine Showalter’s Daughters writing. of Decadence.

In her opening keynote address, Melanie Hawthorne (Texas A&M University) discussed Renée Vivien’s brand of transnational sapphism, offering a fascinating insight into discourses of nationality and sexuality as mental constructions that operate using similar logic. Interestingly, an undeveloped perception of nationality and, As women functioned within decadent correspondingly, sexuality was potentially networks in heterogeneous ways, many empowering for fin-de-siècle women, which papers depicted their embracing of a variety Hawthorne illustrated through a case study

12 of roles such as editor, salon hostess, of femininity and the reconciliation of the performer, illustrator and cultural mediator. erotic with the sacred. In her keynote on Oscar Wilde, Rachilde and the Mercure de France, Petra Dierkes-Thrun Literary influences were also investigated, (Stanford University) argued that Rachilde with Lena Magnone (University of Warsaw) was a central player in the 1890s writing and arguing that the first female psychoanalysts publishing scene in Paris, foregrounding her turned to their early ‘poetic mothers’ to little-known role in enabling much of Wilde’s better understand their own psychological literary networking in France. Dierkes- makeup at a time of profound gender Thrun convincingly demonstrated that renegotiation. For sympathetic Rachilde strategically used her position as representations of women’s issues and co-editor of the Mercure de France to rescue progressive gender roles, 1890s women Wilde’s reputation as a serious writer looked to Scandinavia, as persuasively following his trial, continuing to actively argued by Jad Adams (SOAS, University of champion his work decades after his death. London). This decidedly Scandinavian Building on Dierkes-Thrun’s excellent influence was also outlined by Tina O’Toole introduction to the Mercure de France, Helen (University of Limerick) in her excellent Craske’s (Merton College, University of discussion of George Egerton’s Irish Oxford) paper argued that Rachilde’s decadence. O’Toole argued that Egerton’s reviewing practices facilitated her self- lack of adherence to predefined fixities construction as taste-maker through the concerning nationalities facilitated her strategic promotion and undermining of her deployment of transnational migrants as a literary peers. Elizabeth O’Connor disruptive sign to subvert ideological (Washington College) demonstrated that markers and binaries. fellow producer of decadence, Pamela Colman Smith, ran The Green Sheaf Press Many papers also reconsidered once prolific with a special interest in showcasing and female writers who appear in modern glorifying women writers, providing a scholarship as mere footnotes adorning the platform for otherwise unknown figures. biographies of the key male decadents with whom they were associated. Sophie Gaudier- Less canonical figures also formed the Brzeska, of interest to scholars by virtue of subject of many papers. Emilia Pardo Bazan, her romantic relationship with French a Spanish author whose indisputable sculptor Henri Gaudier Brzeska, was contribution to naturalism has led to her considered by Anna Ready (Oxford neglect in decadence studies, was University Press) as an important trilingual considered by Susana Bardavio Estevan writer who crossed languages and cultures (University of Burgos) and Iris Muñiz and assumed multiple roles and identities. (University of Oslo) in relation to decadence, Joseph Thorne (Liverpool John Moores sexuality and Catholicism. Polish translator University) highlighted the under- and poet Kazimiera Zawistowska was also represented Mabel Beardsley’s construction the subject of papers by Heidi Liedke (Queen and embodiment of the social and creative Mary, University of London) and Ilona ideals of the dandy. Dobosiewicz and Sabina Brzozowska- Dybizbańska (Opole University) who outlined A plenary panel on Olive Custance’s self- her rich contribution to the ‘Young Poland’ fashioning and complex relationship with movement, in a discussion of constructions decadence featured papers by Patricia Pulham (University of Surrey) and Sarah

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Parker (Loughborough University). that traversed borders and reinforced the Supporting her argument with extracts from importance of recovering the many women Custance’s diaries, Pulham presented her involved in decadent networks. The sheer mood poems as self-consciously created volume of original scholarship shared artefacts that subscribed to decadent throughout the conference made a solid case associations between strangeness and for the value of archival research. beauty. Focusing on Custance’s later outputs while making a case for her as a conservative As observed by Stefano Evangelista (Trinity Edwardian decadent, Parker illustrated that College, University of Oxford) in the final those Yellow Book writers actively roundtable with our keynote speakers, the producing at the century’s close offer narratives that emerged through the valuable insight into the complicated ways in conference all told a story of forgetting and which decadence endured and continued to remembering. However, as appreciated by manifest. Indeed, with many papers Hawthorne, sometimes one needs to forget a considering women writing decadence well paradigm in order to write a more coherent into the twentieth century, the conference and honest narrative. The nature of overwhelmingly highlighted the inadequacy forgetting was perhaps best understood by of decadence as a construction of Sappho, and I will leave the final word to her: periodisation and the need for paradigm ‘Someone, I believe, will remember us in the revision. future.’ Nerida Brand (University of Exeter) Thank you to Katharina Herold and Leire Barrera-Medrano for organizing such a timely and fruitful exchange of knowledge

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BAVS Funding Reports

The British Association for Victorian Studies (BAVS) is committed to the support of its members’ activities such as conferences, events and research activities. As such there are two funding streams open to BAVS members:

1) Events funding: up to £800 is available to support the costs of an academic conference or event relating to Victorian studies. The Association and its Executive remain committed to the development of postgraduate students, and it is anticipated that two postgraduate- organised/led events will be funded each academic year. 2) Research funding: up to £500 is available to support the costs of individual research for Postgraduates and Early Career Researchers.

The application forms, including guidance notes and deadlines, are available from: http://bavs.ac.uk/funding. There are two rounds of funding each year, with deadlines in May and November. For further information, please contact the BAVS Funding Officer, Amelia Yeates: [email protected].

A digital resource: Democratising illustration subjects were frequently Knowledge through Chambers’s depicted in encyclopedias during different Encyclopaedia decades. The resource also shows how the economics of the press and the ecosystem of publishing encouraged the growth and then Many BAVS members and 19th century decline of the wood engraving profession. scholars should find the new online resource Furthermore, it showcases the influence of Democratising Knowledge to be both photography in printed mass interesting and helpful to their research. Not communication. only does it provide visual information on the history of printing and publishing, it Access the online resource at: shows that certain illustration styles and https://www.nms.ac.uk/chambers

My contribution to this project was made possible with the assistance of a BAVS Research Funding Award, which enabled me to travel to Edinburgh in November 2017.

Although I am undertaking my PhD from the University of Reading, one of the collections I needed to access is located at National Museum Scotland (NMS). NMS holds 20,000 wood blocks formerly belonging to the W. & R. Chambers firm, and more

15 than 7,000 of those woodblocks were used in effectively communicate my research the production of the first two editions of findings with the general public in non- Chambers’s Encyclopaedia published technical language. between 1860 and 1892. Again, I am extremely grateful to BAVS for For this digital project, completed after helping me with this project. funding from the AHRC was finished, I Rose Roberto (University of Reading and needed to spend some time in Edinburgh National Museums Scotland) further sorting through the uncatalogued collections at National Museum Scotland. I selected over 150 woodblocks for digitisation and met with the Digital Media staff to work out a script, decide layout and navigation, and technical features of a virtual display. I also worked with the Principal Curator of Communications, Alison Taubman, in the Department of Science and Technology, on the specific text for different sections of the online resource. Her expertise helped me to

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Frederic Leighton’s Landscape Art examine as many as eight of Leighton’s landscape oils. The opportunity to study the The British Association for Victorian Studies’ paintings in person helped me to familiarise (BAVS) Research Funding Award that I was myself with Leighton’s actual colour palette fortunate to receive allowed me to and technique, which was all the more significantly expand my research and valuable given the timespan of the viewed expertise on the landscape oil paintings of works, representing Leighton’s both earlier Frederic Leighton (1830-1896). The plein air and later styles. The eight works, viewed sketching practice of the notable President almost simultaneously, display Leighton’s of the Royal Academy was obscure to wider progression in the subsequent years of 1859, public during his day, and it still remains 1866-1868, as well as his late style of the largely unexplored. Even though Leighton 1890s. produced over two hundred canvases and boards of great variety, scholarship has not At Hill Top, Liz Macfarlane was kind enough fully explored them in their own right. With to allow for a closer inspection of Malin Head my doctoral research, I hope to introduce the (Malinmore), Donegal and Bamburgh Castle, full spectrum of Leighton’s landscape works Northumberland, whose versos revealed the painted throughout his life during annual stencils from the sale after Leighton’s death voyages (mostly, but not restricted to, the in 1896. With such undisputed provenance, Mediterranean), as well as to examine them the Hill Top paintings provide an invaluable in the context of Leighton’s scientific and reference for assessing works with mythographic exposure and interests, in uncertain attribution. While Houses on a Cliff addition to situating them in the wider Top in the Mediterranean and View of a Bay context of landscape painting. (Spain) were unfortunately fixed to the wall and it was impossible to remove them that My trips to Beatrix Potter’s Hill Top, the day, I was promised more photographic Glynn Vivian Art Gallery in Swansea and material in November when they will be National Museum Cardiff enabled me to undergoing conservation. It was also

Frederic Lord Leighton, Kynance Cove (c.1885).

17 incredibly fascinating and informative to transition toward the vision of the Etruscan discuss with Liz the crossovers between School of Art leader Giovanni Costa, who Beatrix Potter and Leighton as it provided applied an elongated horizontal format and me with additional context of historic and a more refined finish. This was largely due to artistic importance. Costa’s and Leighton’s joined sketching expedition in the Roman Campagna of 1866. At the Glynn Vivian Art Gallery I was once The Spanish views painted earlier in 1866, in again met with most generous help as Jenny turn, still demonstrate a strong influence of Williamson and Ellie Dawkins had Camille Corot’s studies done in Italy in the dismounted A Spanish View and A Temple on 1820s, with a characteristic fluid handling of the Nile in the newly opened conservation paint and a colour palette with a yellow studio, where I closely examined the details pigment as the base. Finally, the views of of the paintings and their versos, which Donegal and Northumberland represent retained interesting clues regarding their Leighton’s mature style of liberated impasto exhibition history. In the National Museum brushstrokes and a bold use of colours, as Cardiff the Distant View of Mountains in the well as the abandoning of the elongated Aegean Sea and the Coast of Asia Minor Seen horizontal format previously utilised for from Rhodes were on display as part of the distant vistas. Kyffin Williams exhibition. Pola Durajska (University of York)

The two Cardiff paintings of 1867 as well as A Temple on the Nile of 1868 show a

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Reviews

The BAVS Newsletter is always looking for new reviewers, particularly among postgraduate, early- career and independent researchers. To express an interest in reviewing, please include your name, affiliation, current status and five research keywords in an email to [email protected]. Reviewers will be required to join BAVS if they have not done so already. Authors, editors and publishers of recent work on any aspect of Victorian history, literature and culture are also invited to suggest future titles by emailing the same address. Reviews printed in the BAVS Newsletter are distributed to over 600 members around the world and then archived on our open-access website. Reviews will be returned to each book’s publisher to aid their publicity efforts.

Jonathan Memel (Reviews Editor)

Economies of Desire at the Victorian ‘Articulating Desire,’ ‘Human Currencies’ Fin de Siècle: Libidinal Lives, edited and ‘Queer Performativity’. by Jane Ford, Kim Edwards Keates The three essays that make up the and Patricia Pulham (New York and ‘Articulating Desire’ section are tied together London: Routledge, 2016). 214 pp., by their emphasis on the ultimate £110 (hardback) ISBN 978-1-315- ephemerality of desire and the resultant 73937-2 problems of an economy of desire. Veronica Alfano’s ‘A. E. Housman’s Ballad Economies’ Economies of Desire at the Victorian Fin de looks at the ‘subtle homoeroticism’ (35) of Siècle: Libidinal Lives is a wide-ranging text Housman’s ballads and his economical style. that explores the intersection of sexual Alfano coins the term ‘ballad economy’ (35) desire and economic behaviours in late- to describe the poet’s rigid adherence to Victorian writing. Citing the lack of any ‘well- formal constraints as a strategy of both established critical discourse’ (4) on fin-de- occluding and suggesting his homosexuality. siècle economies of desire, Jane Ford, Kim Ruth Robbins’s ‘Always Leave Them Edwards Keates and Patricia Pulham Wanting More: Oscar Wilde’s Salome and the position the text as a bold, crucial Failed Circulation of Desire’ and Jane intervention in the field. While much has Desmerais’ ‘Perfume Clouds: Olfaction, been written on late-Victorian sexuality and Memory, and Desire in Arthur Symons’s on fin-de-siècle economies and consumption London Nights (1895)’ both begin with as discrete topics, this study unites the decadent commodities. Robbins draws an themes. The editors suggest that studies of intriguing parallel between Wilde’s public libidinal economies in modernism, including praise and use of cigarettes as the perfect Joseph Allen Boone’s Libidinal Currents: pleasure and their popular association with Sexuality and the Shaping of Modernism the New Woman to suggest his gender (1998) and Kathryn Simpson’s Gifts, Markets subversion. Desmerais’ focus on decadent and Economies of Desire in Virginia Woolf perfume represents an intervention into an (2008), fail to recognise the Victorian roots emerging field of Victorian scent studies and of this field. This collection addresses this should perhaps be read alongside Catherine omission, using these modernist frames of Maxwell’s Scents and Sensibility (2017). The reference to re-evaluate fin-de-siècle literary ephemeral nature of scent, Desmerais and artistic sexual markets (both social and argues, becomes a powerful signifier of financial). The assembled nine essays are memory in Symons’s poetry. grouped together into three sections:

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The ‘Human Currencies’ section explores the de-siècle writers. Although presented by W. precarious position of women and the B. Yeats in the Oxford Book of Modern Verse female body in the economy of desire. Ford’s (1936) as emblematic of the decadent ethos, ‘Greek Gift and “Given Being”: The Libidinal Stenbock, in particular, has been largely Economies of Vernon Lee’s Supernatural excluded from the critical discourse. This Tales’ looks at the interaction of gender, makes Matthew Bradley’s ‘Living Parody: classical myth and gift theory. Drawing from Eric, Count Stenbock, and Economies of Marcel Maus’ The Gift (1925), Ford expands Perversity’ especially exciting for the light it Maus’ focus by emphasising the role of casts on this obscure(d) decadent. While not women within a gift economy; under a claiming any great literary pedigree for patriarchal social economy, women are Stenbock’s writing — Bradley rhetorically defined by their ‘thingness’ (108). This is not asks ‘don’t bad writers have a right to necessarily a new development in and of perform themselves and their sexuality, itself — critics such as Ilana Krausman Ben- too?’ (151) — this essay uses Stenbock to Amos (The Culture of Giving: Informal understand the value of Support and Gift-Exchange in Early Modern social/artistic/personal currencies in the England, 2008) and social theorists like decadent marketplace. Another form of Aafke E. Komter (Social Solidarity and the performance is highlighted in Kristin Gift, 2005) have emphasised the relationship Mahoney’s ‘Camp Aesthetics and Inequality: between women and gifts — but it is Baron Corvo’s Toto Stories.’ Mahoney argues refreshing to see this focus brought to the that Corvo’s authoritarian leanings are fore in late-Victorian studies. Meanwhile, performative and that the problematic Sarah Parker looks at the connections power dynamics of the stories are unsettled between the Victorian Amy Levy and the by camp exaggeration to expose ‘the modernist Djuna Barnes through their use of absurdity of hierarchy by forcing it to its the ‘categorised and commoditised’ female extremes’ (163). Jill R. Ehnenn’s ‘“Our brains corpse (83) in her essay ‘Urban Economies struck fire from each other”: and the Dead-Woman Muse in the Poetry of Disidentification, Difference and Desire in Amy Levy and Djuna Barnes’. Rather than the Collaborative Aesthetics of Michael Field’ simply repackaging a misogynist trope, looks at the lesbian partnership of the Parker suggests these writers Michael Fields (Katharine Harris Bradley counterbalance the ‘ghosting’ of lesbian and Edith Emma Cooper), a creative and desire with a thoroughly embodied, fertile artistic pairing on the social margins. In her corpse (97). The human currencies of Parker essay, Ehnenn examines how they and Ford are figurative, but Catherine performed their relationship through poetry Delyfer’s ‘The Aesthete, the Banker and the and letter-writing. She argues that by Saint: Economies of Desire in Lucas Malet’s presenting their collaborative approach to [Mary St Leger Kingsley Harrison] Far writing as a form of ‘closer’ marriage (185), Horizon (1906)’ explores the relationship the Michael Fields were able to appropriate between literature and the Victorian the language of authorised heterosexual love economy. Malet’s novel, which has received to signify both their same-sex relationship little critical attention, challenges many of and to ‘celebrate their shared experience of the received assumptions about aesthetic womanhood’ (200). literature and, Delyfer suggests, offers a utopian ‘economy of giving’ (138) as an Economies of Desire is a timely intervention alternative to exploitative capitalism. into the field of late-Victorian studies. While texts about the fin-de-siècle literary The final section, ‘Queer Performativity,’ marketplace are not new (take for instance, focuses on marginal (and marginalised) fin- Regenia Gagnier’s Idylls of the Marketplace: 20

Oscar Wilde and the Victorian Public, 1986), establishes all of his subjects well and the art this book’s emphasis on sex, sexuality and historian Anna Jameson (1794-1860), in desire is a refreshing addition. The focus on particular, comes across as an intelligent obscured writers, material cultures and woman who was well aware of what she was literary self-performance illuminates the doing. The journalist Hannah Lawrance economic drives of late-Victorian sexuality. (1795-1875) argued that even before the Joseph Thorne (Liverpool John Moores reign of Elizabeth I there were educated University women who contributed to England’s progress. Lawrance’s suggestion was that these women were positive historical Women as Public Moralists in Britain: examples of the way in which the education From the Bluestockings to Virginia of women could have positive results. Woolf, by Benjamin Dabby The second half of the book introduces new (Woodbridge, Suffolk: The Boydell women moralists. Dabby goes into more Press for the Royal Historical Society, depth on subjects introduced in Part I, 2017), 288pp. £50.00 (hardback) namely Anna Jameson and Hannah ISBN 978-0-8619-3343-3 Lawrance. The articles of Marian Evans, better known as the author George Eliot Benjamin Dabby’s book explores women’s (1819-1880), are considered, showing how role as cultural critics and assesses their her later novels emulated similar views and impact on the wider women’s movement. principles. Dabby highlights her significant This is a subject that, so the author agues, has influence on individuals and larger groups. been neglected by recent critics. From the In Part III, the writer Beatrice Hastings outset, the Dabby’s dedication to and passion (1879-1943) and the critic Rebecca West for his subject and the women moralists he (1892-1983) represent both continuity and discusses, from Anna Jameson (1794-1868) change. Although gender is presented as a to Virginia Woolf (1882-1941), is clearly lesser issue in this period, capitalism is show evident. Dabby’s introduction is precise and to stifle the socialist movement for both men clear, making it easy to pinpoint his overall and women. Each of these women believed objectives and aims for each chapter. He has in the intellectual emancipation of both a way of educating while also critically genders under the right conditions, and yet analysing his subject matter, so that a reader they were “not friends” (193). This section with little to no knowledge can fully defines the way in which the same end could understand the background and discussion, be fought for in very different ways. while those with a deeper knowledge can engage in more complex ideas. Dabby’s final chapter on Woolf could in itself be a standalone article. With a clear In the main body of the text, Dabby introduction missing from previous highlights the ways in which his subjects chapters, it is evident that the contents of were able to provide reassurance and act as this final section are well argued. Dabby is representatives of advancement through keen to highlight how his argument differs moral instruction, while not necessarily from previous scholarship: “the link involving themselves with women’s rights. between Woolf’s literary criticism and her In fact, the writer Eliza Lynn Linton (1822- later criticism has been made before, 1898) was actively anti-suffragette and sometimes in quite different terms to those believed that women’s literary of this chapter” (208). Interestingly, there is achievements should never come at ‘the a reappearance of a more gendered view of expense of their femininity’ (183). Dabby the past in Woolf’s Three Guineas (1938), 21 which is analysed in detail. This provides a The Second Anglo-Sikh War, by fascinating discussion of how Woolf Amarpal Singh (Stroud: Amberley returned to the views of her predecessors Publishing, 2017), 513pp., £20 such as Lawrance. (paperback) ISBN 9781445671130

In his conclusion, Dabby states that he “has Amarpal Singh’s The Second Anglo-Sikh War attempted to show how women moralists in is an important piece of traditional military nineteenth- and twentieth-century Britain history. Scholars have largely overlooked the lived not as prisoners of discourse but as First and Second Anglo-Sikh Wars and this highly literate individuals” (229). He most account, alongside Singh’s 2010 work on the certainly has accomplished this and achieves First Anglo-Sikh War, lays an impressively all that he sets out in his introduction, detailed foundation upon which further producing a complete and well-rounded work may be built. The Second Anglo-Sikh argument. In some instances the background War is divided into four sections: ‘Prelude’, information consumes the main focus of the ‘Insurrection’, ‘War’, and ‘Dissolution’. text, but these are infrequent. ‘Prelude’ situates the outbreak of war in the context of the First Anglo-Sikh War (1845– Dabby’s book is one that should be 1846), which had ended with the Treaty of considered useful reading, not only for those Lahore and the establishment of a British with a particular interest in the specific representative at Lahore, essentially ending women he writes about, or public moralists Sikh independence and the tensions that more generally, but also for anyone resulted. ‘Insurrection’ details the events researching the history of women’s rights. leading up to the war, exploring how minor Although Studies in History is clearly legible provincial disturbances were allowed to across the front cover, anyone with an develop into a widespread conflict. The interest in literature, cultural and women’s chapters of ‘War’ are divided between the studies as well as history should not ignore two main fronts: the siege of the city of the value of what is evidently an Multan and the series of battles between the interdisciplinary text. armies of Shere Singh and the British East India Company. The annexation of the There is balance in Dabby’s arguments, as Punjab and the fates of the Sikh commanders well as his considerations of facts and are dealt with in the final section. Singh also information. He makes his points and includes several appendices, providing opinions known clearly, but also additional information on the battlefields acknowledges and explores other and the text of certain key documents, arguments. The fifty-seven page including the Treaties of Lahore and bibliography is organised well. And while the Amritsar. extensive footnotes highlight other scholarship, they do not impose on the main The Second Anglo-Sikh War was a relatively body of the text, which is itself rich with brief conflict, lasting from April 1848 to information. Overall, Dabby has produced a March 1849, and one that demonstrated the well-balanced and informative piece of value of heavy artillery. Singh’s account work. makes a strong argument for artillery being Philippa Abbott (University of Sunderland) the deciding factor in an otherwise equally matched conflict. Describing military manoeuvrings and actions is obviously Singh’s forte: marches, encampments, and battles are presented with detail and clarity.

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The early chapters of Singh’s account rely analysis of the possible role played by the heavily on correspondence between the exiled Maharani Jind Kaur in instigating the principal parties. He takes advantage of this war, suggests that a closer examination of to examine the tensions generated by gender in relation to the Second Anglo-Sikh personal relationships and diplomatic War could prove valuable to future scholars. necessities prior to the outbreak of war. Singh uses the public and private Overall, Singh takes a nuanced approach to correspondence between three of the main discussing the motivations of the various actors — Dewan Mulraj, governor of Multan; participants. It would be remiss, however, Dost Mohammed, Emir of Afghanistan; and not to call attention to the way in which Lord Dalhousie, Governor-General of India Afghan and Muslim tribal activity are — to particular advantage, as each man described. Unlike the two primary attempted to manipulate the others into the antagonists, to whom political, economic, course of action most beneficial to himself. and nationalist motives are attributed, the Singh quotes heavily from the Muslim inhabitants of the Punjab are correspondence, allowing the reader to gain assumed to have joined the conflict due to a a sense of the personalities driving the natural proclivity for violence. They were conflict and of the very human reasons for its ‘always ready for tumult’ (120), possessing outbreak. an ‘immun[ity] to the lure of organised government’ (49). Singh comes close to After 400 pages chronicling the events of the accepting the racist and Orientalist rhetoric war, its aftermath is dealt with in just sixty. of the Victorian politicians and officers he The dismantling of the Sikh empire is briefly cites as fact, rather than examining the recounted, but the book would have likelihood that neither the Sikh nor British benefitted from a more detailed examination Empire was terribly concerned with of the immediate aftermath of the war. Singh respecting the rights of indigenous people. raises the interesting question of the war’s confused status: was it a rebellion against Numerous maps of battle sites are included. the Lahore Durbar that had simply been put Though generally useful for visualising troop down with British help (as had been claimed movements, most do not include a key or throughout), or was it in actuality a scale and some are incompletely labelled. In nationalist uprising against ever-increasing a work of this calibre, it is disappointing that British control (which would make it easier there are numerous errors that should have to justify annexation)? As the war was been identified during the editing process. closely followed and hotly discussed by the Most are minor typographical or popular press in both India and England, grammatical errors, but they are frequent with the question of annexation being enough to be distracting to the reader. openly debated since the First Anglo-Sikh War, it would seem that there is far more The Second Anglo-Sikh War has much to that could be said on the subject. recommend it to both general and academic audiences. It is thoroughly researched and Aside from its value as a detailed summary utilises a range of fascinating primary of the events of the conflict, this book sources, though academics may be presents multiple avenues for further frustrated by the lack of footnotes. Perhaps a research. Singh mentions, for example, that bit dense for the casual reader, this book George Lawrence and his wife, held hostage nonetheless provides an important insight throughout the duration of the war, both into an oft-overlooked moment in the discussed military strategy with Sikh history of British imperialism. officers. This insight, coupled with Singh’s Devin Dattan (University of York) 23

Recent Publications

Heidi Liedke, The Experience of Idling in brings together a fresh selection of Victorian Travel Texts, 1850-1901 accounts viewed through the lens of (Palgrave Macmillan, 2018). ISBN: cultural studies as well as accounts of 9783319958613. Ebook £43.99; publication history and author biography. hardcover £54.99. Travel texts from different genres (by writers such as Anna Mary Howitt, Jerome K. Jerome and George Gissing) are brought together as representing the different facets of the spectrum of idleness in the Victorian context.

More information can be found here.

Joanne Ella Parsons & Ruth Heholt (eds), The Victorian Male Body (Edinburgh University Press, 2018). ISBN: Hardback: 9781474428606; eBook (ePub): 9781474428637; eBook (PDF): 9781474428620. 272 pp. £75.00.

A bold study on the very epicentre of Victorian ideology: the white, male body

This book brings together theories of spatiality and mobility with a study of travel writing in the Victorian period to suggest that ‘idleness’ is an important but neglected condition of subjectivity in that era. Contrary to familiar stereotypes of ‘the Victorians’ as characterized by speed, work, and mechanized travel, this books asserts a counter-narrative in which certain writers embraced idleness in travel as a radical means to ‘re-subjectification’ and the assertion of a ‘late-Romantic’ sensibility. Attentive to the historical and literary continuities between ‘Romantic’ and ‘Victorian’, the book reconstructs the Victorian discourse on idleness. It draws on an interdisciplinary range of theorists and

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The Victorian Male Body examines some of homosociality, morality, action, and the main expressions and practices of adventure Victorian masculinity and its embodied physicality. The white, and frequently Contents middle class, male body was often normalised as the epitome of Victorian Introduction: Visible and Invisible Bodies, values. Whilst there has been a long and Ruth Heholt and Joanne Ella Parsons fruitful discussion around the concept of I. Constructed Bodies the ‘too-visible’ body of the colonised 1. Violent Play and Regular Discipline: The subject and the expectations placed on Abuses of the Schoolboy Body in Victorian women’s bodies, the idealised male body Fiction, Alice Crossley has received less attention in scholarly 2. Punishing the unregulated manly body discussions. Through its examination of a and emotions in early Victorian England, broad range of Victorian literary and Joanne Begiato cultural texts, this new collection opens up 3. The New Man’s Body in Ménie Muriel a previously neglected field of study with a Dowie’s Gallia, Tara MacDonald scrutinising focus on what is arguably the II. Fractured and Fragmented Bodies ideologically most important body in 4. Pirates and Prosthetics: Manly Messages Victorian society. for Managing Limb Loss in Victorian and Edwardian Adventure Narratives, Ryan This collection provides a wide variety of Sweet, 5. Tuberculosis and Visionary essays on different aspects of Victorian Sensibility: The Consumptive Body as literature and culture, considering the Masculine Dissent in George Eliot and variety of forms that this ‘idealised’ male Henry James, Meredith Miller body actually encompassed: fat, starving or 6. Monstrous Masculinities from the disabled bodies, the ghostly figure, the Macaroni to the Masher: Reading the Gothic ‘othered’ body, and the developing body of ‘Gentleman’, Alison Younger the schoolboy. The chapters in this book 7. Visible Yet Immaterial: The Phantom and offer a detailed and clear reassessment of the Male Body in Ghost Stories by Three the Victorian concepts of manliness, Victorian Women Writers, Ruth Heholt masculinity, homosociality, morality, III. Unruly Bodies action, and adventure. 8. Aesthetics of Deviance: George du Maurier's Representations of the Artist's Key Features Body for Punch as Discourse on Manliness, • Provides a wide variety of essays on 1870-1880, Françoise Baillet different aspects of Victorian literature 9. Suffering, Asceticism and the Starving and culture with subjects ranging from Male Body in Mary Barton, Charlotte Boyce nature poetry, disability and pirates, fat 10. Fosco’s Fat: Transgressive and thin men, ghost soldiers and Consumption and Bodily Control in Wilkie popular magazines Collins’ The Woman in White, Joanne Ella • Opens up a neglected field of study with Parsons a scrutinizing focus on the ideologically 11. Sensationalizing Otherness: The Italian most important body in Victorian Male Body in Mary Elizabeth Braddon’s society ‘Olivia’ and ‘Garibaldi’, Anne-Marie Beller. • Allows a re-evaluation of other areas of Victorian culture such as colonialism and debates about class, religion and scienceEnables a detailed and clear reassessment of the Victorian concepts of manliness, masculinity, 25

criticism. One can see that this process also Arthur Machen's 1890s Notebook helped Machen shape and criticise his own edited by The Friends of Arthur fiction. Machen (2016; repr. 2018). ISBN 978-1-912586-03-5. Paperback http://www.tartaruspress.com/machen- 1890s-notebook.html £19.95.

Eleanora Sasso, The Pre-Raphaelites and Orientalism: Language and Cognition in Remediations of the East (Edinburgh University Press, 2018). ISBN: Hardback: 9781474407168 eBook (ePub): 9781474407182 eBook (PDF): 9781474407175 £75.00

Arthur Machen’s 1890s notebook, now kept at the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas, provides an insight into the mind of Machen during what was arguably the most creative decade of his career as an author.

In the notebook Machen contemplated and abandoned ideas for the novel that was to become The Hill of Dreams, and he also made notes towards the composition of fiction that was eventually to be published as Ornaments in Jade, 'The White People' and 'A Fragment of Life'. In the notebook one may also encounter ideas towards Investigates the latent and manifest traces what was to become the novel The Secret of the East in Pre-Raphaelite literature and Glory. culture

Machen also made intriguing notes for The Pre-Raphaelites and Orientalism: fiction that was never finished, and Language and Cognition in Remediations of explored what constituted Great Literature, the East redefines the task of interpreting a process that contributed towards the the East in the late nineteenth century. composition of Hieroglyphics, his very Weaving together literary, linguistic and personal and idiosyncratic book of literary cognitive analyses of Pre-Raphaelite

26 paintings, illustrations and writings, socio- Charles Lansley, Darwin's Debt to the cultural investigations of the Orient, and Romantics: How Alexander von rhetorical considerations about Arabian Humboldt, Goethe and Wordsworth forms of writing, the terms of critical Helped Shape Charles Darwin's View debate surrounding the East are redefined. of Nature (Peter Lang, 2018). It takes as a starting point Edward Said’s ISBN: 978-1-78707-138-4. Orientalism (1978) in order to investigate Hardback. 306 pp. £60.00. the latent and manifest traces of the East in Pre-Raphaelite literature and culture. As the book demonstrates, the Pre- Raphaelites and their associates appeared to be the most eligible representatives of a profoundly conservative manifestation of the Orient, of its mystic aura, criminal underworld, and feminine sensuality, or to put it into Arabic terms, of its aja’ib (marvels), mutalibun (treasure-hunters) and hur al-ayn (femmes fatales).

Key Features: • Looks at how selected examples of Pre- Raphaelite writings acted as major vehicles for raising awareness of cultural diversity The author traces the influences that • Redefines the task of interpreting the contributed to the development of Charles East in the late nineteenth century Darwin’s imagination leading to his theory taking as a starting point Edward Said’s of natural selection. This asks the question Orientalism (1978) of whether they could be regarded as • By investigating the pervasive Romantic and square with Darwin being a influence of The Arabian Nights on Pre- Victorian naturalist and gentleman. Raphaelite texts, this study aims at bringing together Western and Eastern Darwin took Alexander von Humboldt’s forms of writing Personal Narrative with him on the Beagle • Outlines the reasons why the writings and this is analysed alongside Darwin’s by John Ruskin, D.G. Rossetti, Christina works to identify any influences. Darwin Rossetti, William Morris, Algernon refers to the concept of ‘archetype’ a Swinburne, Aubrey Beardsley, and number of times in his Origin and this is Ford Madox Ford play such a examined to see if he might have been prominent role in the Oriental debate influenced by Goethe’s use of the concept. If so, could Darwin have been influenced by the German Romantics? Darwin also refers

to the English Romantic poet William

Wordsworth in his notebooks, yet in his

Autobiography he describes all poetry as creating a feeling of nausea. The author looks into this contradiction to see if Romantic poetry had an effect on Darwin’s imagination. Darwin also denied that his grandfather, Erasmus Darwin, had had any influence on him. The author analyses his

27 poetry to trace any influences and whether Goldsmiths, University of London, any of these could be regarded as Volupté is dedicated to promoting cutting- strengthening the view that Charles Darwin edge work by creative writers and artists was Romantic. The book cleverly follows and publishing the best research on Darwin’s form of the narrative in searching Decadence by early career and established for traces of history both in science and scholars. poetry, and this is achieved with the same inspired imagination as Darwin’s. Further information can be found on our website: https://volupte.gold.ac.uk Details of the publication can be found on Or follow us on Twitter for news updates: the Peter Lang web page at @VolupteJournal https://www.peterlang.com/abstract/pro duct/78878?rskey=A5Ep9m&result=1 Journal of Victorian Culture

Volupté: Interdisciplinary Journal of Special Issue: 23.2 (2018): Decadence Studies Victorians Beyond the Academy Issue 1, ‘Arthur Symons at the Fin de Siècle’ Curating the Victorians: Introduction June 2018 Jane Hamlett Journal of Victorian Culture, Volume 23, Issue 2, 27 April 2018, Pages 161– 163, https://doi.org/10.1093/jvcult/vcy0 01

Curating the Victorians Gail Marshall Journal of Victorian Culture, Volume 23, We are delighted to announce that Issue 1 Issue 2, 27 April 2018, Pages 164– of Volupté: Interdisciplinary Journal of 169, https://doi.org/10.1093/jvcult/vcy0 Decadence Studies has been published! You 03 can view and download the articles at: https://volupte.gold.ac.uk/current-issue Understanding the Victorians through Museum Displays Volupté is an open access online journal of Jack Gann; Lauren Padgett Decadence from antiquity to the present. It Journal of Victorian Culture, Volume 23, appears each year in Spring and Autumn, Issue 2, 27 April 2018, Pages 170– and brings together in themed issues 186, https://doi.org/10.1093/jvcult/vcx0 creative and critical approaches to the fast- 16 growing field of Decadence studies. The aim of Volupté is to enhance and Victorian Railway Things: Working as a broaden the scope of Decadence studies Research Fellow in a Technological and stimulate discussion in relation to Museum literary Decadence and other forms of Oliver Betts discourse, including Philosophy, Journal of Victorian Culture, Volume 23, Psychology, Religion, and Science. Peer- Issue 2, 27 April 2018, Pages 187– reviewed essays and book reviews will be 196, https://doi.org/10.1093/jvcult/vcy0 published alongside new translations, 05 poetry, short fiction, and visual art. Based at

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Working with the National Army ARTICLES Museum: The Afterlife of the Crimea and Cross Bones Graveyard: Excavating the the Benefits of a CDA Prostitute in Neo-Victorian Popular Rachel Bates Culture Journal of Victorian Culture, Volume 23, Claire Nally Issue 2, 27 April 2018, Pages 197– Journal of Victorian Culture, Volume 23, 206, https://doi.org/10.1093/jvcult/vcy0 Issue 2, 27 April 2018, Pages 247– 04 261, https://doi.org/10.1093/jvc/vcx006

Curating ‘Homes of the Homeless’ Jane Hamlett; Hannah Fleming Issue 23.3 Journal of Victorian Culture, Volume 23, Issue 2, 27 April 2018, Pages 207– Nathan Booth, Drinking and Domesticity: 219, https://doi.org/10.1093/jvcult/vcy0 The Materiality of the Mid-Nineteenth- 06 Century Provincial Pub

DIGITAL FORUM Molly Boggs, “Given to You by Nature for an Digital Heritage Enemy”: The Landlady in Mid-century Zoe Alker; Christopher Donaldson London Journal of Victorian Culture, Volume 23,

Issue 2, 27 April 2018, Pages 220– David A. Ibitson, ‘A book in his hand, – but 221, https://doi.org/10.1093/jvcult/vcy0 it couldn’t be a prayer-book’: The Self- 19 Awareness of William Harrison

Ainsworth’s Newgate Novels From Analogue to Digital: Word and

Image Digitization Projects at the V&A Elly McCausland, Caverns Measureless to Douglas Dodds Man: Subterranean Rivers and Journal of Victorian Culture, Volume 23, Adventurous Masculinities in the Victorian Issue 2, 27 April 2018, Pages 222– Lost World Novel 230, https://doi.org/10.1093/jvcult/vcy0

20 Jordan Kistler, Mesmeric Rapport: The

Power of Female Sympathy in Bram The UK Medical Heritage Library and Stoker’s Dracula the Relationship Between Print and the

Digital Elizabeth Rawlinson-Mills, Soldiers of the Peter Findlay Queen: Reading Newspaper Fiction of the Journal of Victorian Culture, Volume 23, South African War (1899–1902) Issue 2, 27 April 2018, Pages 231–

237, https://doi.org/10.1093/jvcult/vcy0 Helena Goodwyn, A ‘New’ Journalist: The 21 Americanization of W. T. Stead

Digitizing a Hospital Archive: The Alison Hedley, Data Visualization and Retreat, York Population Politics in Pearson’s Magazine, Jenny Mitcham 1896–1902 Journal of Victorian Culture, Volume 23,

Issue 2, 27 April 2018, Pages 238– 246, https://doi.org/10.1093/jvcult/vcy0 22

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Calls for Submissions (Print)

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Calls for Papers (Conferences)

‘Locating Health: Regional Historical and improvements to workhouse infirmaries Perspectives on Human Care 1800-1948’ occurred on a local basis, and spread only gradually. University of Nottingham, As a result, the experiences of patients, nurses, 11 January 2019, 10.00 – 16.00. doctors and other care practitioners differed significantly according to geographical location, as Keynote speaker: Professor Christine Hallett well as by class, wealth, and gender. This workshop (University of Huddersfield) seeks to highlight these local and regional differences and experiences in order to build up a This one-day workshop seeks to bring together more textured, nuanced picture of the development researchers with an interest in the history and of healthcare in the industrial age. representations of healthcare, medicine, nursing, hospitals, and public health in the UK between 1800 This workshop is the first of a series to be held and 1948, with a particular focus on local and arising from the AHRC-funded project ‘Florence regional histories. Nightingale Comes Home for 2020’, which examines the influence of Nightingale’s upbringing in the Over the course of the nineteenth century, Midlands on her work and ideas. This first workshop healthcare became increasingly organised, invites contributions from a wide range of scholars centralised and professionalised, paving the way for in order to develop insights into broader histories of the reforms of the twentieth century leading to a health and care in a regional perspective. national healthcare system. But this process was piecemeal and haphazard, often dependent on local Possible themes for contribution include: and even individual initiatives. Hospitals were • How can localised studies of historical health funded by local subscriptions; reforms such as the and care contribute to a broader understanding introduction of professional nurses, district nursing,

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of the state of health and healthcare in the C21 Global Victorians: When East Meets nineteenth and early twentieth centuries? West • How did standards of, and access to healthcare University of Warwick vary according to regional differences? How did 15 February 2018 patient experiences differ by region? • How was healthcare delivered in the home? How Keynote speakers: did this differ from its delivery in institutional Professor Regenia Gagnier, University of Exeter environments? Were there significant overlaps Professor Stefano Evangelista, University of between conceptions of health at home and in Oxford institutions? • How can studies of individual institutions, such The images of the Other usually stage the national as workhouse infirmaries, hospitals, and nursing consciousness of the native/Self (C. Marez, 2015). homes, contribute to broader regional and national histories of health? Each society imagines the other based on its own • How did hospital nursing, district nursing and social, political, religious and ethical tradition, women’s involvement in healthcare develop spiritual paradigms, and perspectives on humanity differently in different areas? and the world. The description of foreigners touches • How did connections and divisions between the on the things that are most intrinsic and most rural and the urban inform healthcare? fundamental to any society or culture. “A society’s • How did representations of health vary across view of foreigners may at times be one of disinterest, localities? How might we better understand or curiosity, or rapturous approval, or unjust these regional cultures of health? condescension or hatred. But the reasons for this

infatuation or repulsion are in themselves always Practical details enlightening.” (J. Gernet,1994). The problematic term “Oriental” abounds fascinating arguments, and An abstract of no more than 300 words along with a have already developed into an established school in short (1-2 page) CV should be sent to post-colonial studies since the publication of [email protected] by Friday 16 Edward Said’s Orientalism (1978). It seems that the November 2018. Western images in Eastern context, however,

comparatively received less scholarly attention. The workshop is fully funded as part of the AHRC Therefore, while exploring the Asian images in the Research Grant-funded project ‘Florence long 19th-century art and literature, this conference Nightingale Comes Home for 2020: an historico- also wishes to address a reversed gaze at the “exotic” literary analysis of her family life’, grant ref Occidental Other to present that such intercultural AH/R00014X/1. exchanges between the two are in fact mutual. The

Victorian style is also a major commercial There will be no charge for attendance. inspiration in the creative industry in the 21st

century. The increasingly popular Neo-Victorian A limited number of travel bursaries are available trend in films and fashion arena is encouraging an for travel within the UK. To apply, please include an examination of such “exotic” images in a modern estimate of your travel costs in your email interpretation. application.

This event aims to create a multi-disciplinary forum where Victorianists and scholars interested in material culture of the Victorian era, in general, to discuss different approaches to study the cultural interchanges between the two sides of the globe – with a focus on East and South East Asia – within the framework of the long 19th century and its legacy in

37 the 21st, highlighting the interconnections between British Empire/ the United Kingdoms and countries the “Oriental” and the “Occidental”. and regions of East Asia and South-East Asia Publishing opportunities: We welcome expressions of interest for papers of This conference is funded by the Humanities 15-20 minutes long. Research Centre and the Department of English and Comparative Literary Studies. The outcome of this Please send your abstracts entitled with your name project will be considered for the Warwick Series in as the document name (of up to 250 words) to the Humanities (with Routledge) publication. [email protected] by 10 November 2018. In addition, Routeldge's senior editor has directly contacted the organiser to inquire an interest in Possible themes, approaches, and topics might publishing a book of the conference papers for their include: new series Modern History since 1800. • Otherness and diaspora doriangray-musical-korea-07.jpgSouth Korean • Orientalism in Aestheticism Musical Dorian Gray: A New Musical (2016) starred • Neo-Victorian Aestheticism in the Orient by Kim Junsu. Picture Credit: Stellar Sisters • Victorian Material Cultures • Chinoiserie Conference Organiser: • Japonism • Wildeana Dee Wu (吴荻) University of Warwick • Beardsleyana • Sexuality and gender External Advisors: • Consuming the Victorians Flair Donglai Shi (施东来), University of Oxford • Dandyism and Fashion Joseph Thorne, Liverpool John Moors University • Neo-Victorian in manga/anime/video games Qiong Yu (余琼) SOAS University of London NB: This conference has a geographical focus. We welcome any studies on the relations between the FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD 38

A Thomas Hardy Society Study Day in according to one contemporary critic. The Thomas association with the University of Exeter Hardy Society warmly invites proposals for twenty- Saturday 13 April, 2019 at 10.00am minute presentations on any aspect of Far From the The Corn Exchange, Dorchester Madding Crowd which may include, but are not limited to:

KEYNOTE SPEAKERS: • Sexual double standards Trish Ferguson (Liverpool Hope University) • Feminism versus misogyny Paul Niemeyer (Texas A&M International University) Tony Fincham (The Thomas Hardy Society) • The concept of 'Wessex' Angelique Richardson (University of Exeter) and • Rural values and the organic pastoral Helen Angear (University of Exeter and DCM) • Realism within fiction • Nature and empathy 2019 will mark the 145th anniversary of the • Science and cosmology publication of Far From the Madding Crowd, the • Eros and Thanatos novel whose success allowed Hardy to give up architecture and become a full-time writer. In A day designed to appeal to academics and general December 1874 The Spectator surmised that 'either enthusiasts alike, the Society is once again offering George Eliot had written it, or she had found her two bursaries of £50 each to students wishing to match'. Hardy's delineation of character was divisive attend who would otherwise find travel or from the outset, R.H. Hutton declared Sargent Troy accommodation costs prohibitive. Please send and Farmer Boldwood to be 'conceived and executed proposals of not more than 350 words, and no later with very great power'; while Henry James than 28 February 2019, along with a brief memorably stated that 'the only things we believe in description, if you are a student, of how a bursary are the sheep and the dogs'. It is a tale of sexual would benefit your studies, to Dr Tracy Hayes (THS hypocrisy, female emancipation and male insanity, Student Co-Ordinator and Social Media Advisor) at yet also contains passages of sparkling wit and [email protected] humour, the rustics and the rural countryside being 'painted with the pen of a considerable artist'

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