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Bad Mothers in Eighteenth-Century Fiction Siobhan O’Donnell

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Bad Mothers in Eighteenth-Century Fiction Siobhan O’Donnell Bad Mothers in Eighteenth-Century Fiction Siobhan O’Donnell A major thesis presented as full requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in English School of English, National University of Ireland, Maynooth. 30th October 2012 Head of Department: Professor Chris Morash Supervisor: Doctor Conrad Brunstrom Page i Table of Contents Acknowledgements ................................................................................................... iv Summary .................................................................................................................... v INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................ 1 CHAPTER ONE ............................................................................................................. 14 Historizing Motherhood: Courtship, Education, Marriage, Child Mortality and Pregnancy. ‗We have reason to conclude, that great Care is to be had of the forming Children‘s Minds, and give them that seasoning early, which shall influence their Lives always after.‘ John Locke, The Educational Writings of John Locke (1693). CHAPTER TWO ............................................................................................................ 69 From Avarice in the Heroines of Daniel Defoe to Altruism in Eliza Haywood’s Heroines. ‗If a young Woman have Beauty, Birth, Breeding, Wit, Sense, Manners, Modesty, and all these to an Extream; yet if she have not Money, she‘s no Body, she had as good want them all, for nothing but Money now recommends a Woman.‘ Daniel Defoe‘s Moll Flanders. CHAPTER THREE ....................................................................................................... 117 3.1 Pamela: The Exemplary Mother. ‗We should then make better daughters, better wives, better mothers, and better mistresses.‘ Samuel Richardson‘s Pamela. 3.2 Clarissa and the Milk of Human Kindness. ‗…virtuous, noble, wise, pious, unhappily ensnared by the vows and oaths of a vile rake.‘ Samuel Richardson‘s Clarissa. Page ii 3.3 Matronised by Motherhood in The History of Sir Charles Grandison. ‗Lady Grandison‘s goodness was founded in principle: not in tameness or servility.‘ Samuel Richardson's The History of Sir Charles Grandison. CHAPTER FOUR ......................................................................................................... 233 Jean Jacques Rousseau and Utopian and Dystopian Mothers. ‗We know nothing of childhood; and with our mistaken notions the further we advance the further we go astray.‘ Jean Jacques Rousseau‘s Émile. CONCLUSION ............................................................................................................. 277 BIBLIOGRAPHY ......................................................................................................... 294 Page iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First and foremost I would like to extend my heartfelt thanks to my supervisor, Doctor Conrad Brunstrom, whose unwavering support, comments and tactful intelligence provided me with invaluable assistance and insight. I would also like to extend my thanks to the English Department at Maynooth, especially Professor Chris Morash for his support. A very special word of thanks is due to Doctor Bernadette Trehy for her friendship and generous support. Grateful thanks also are due to my sister Marie Larkin for her steadfast support during my studies. A thank you is also due to the library staff at Maynooth for their efficiency and helpful advice. Finally, I would like to express my love and gratitude to my husband John and my daughter Clióna for their support and patience in seeing me through the long years of study. Page iv SUMMARY Focusing on texts written during the eighteenth century, and charting the connections between literary novels and contemporary discourse, this dissertation examines the role of the mother within this literature. I argue that contemporary fictional writers wrote important texts that reflect the wider historical conditions of the family, as well as the social, cultural and religious background of this period. Some of the narratives reflect public anxiety over the ever-increasing commercialization of England during the eighteenth century. Within family life, political, literary and philosophical hypotheses were compelled to adjust in a continuously changing society. Initially, the historical and ideological framework is set where the problems faced by the characters examined subsequently develop. The common theme within the novels is the female characters‘ shared experience as mothers and daughters. The narratives of these authors functioned as a means of critiquing the lack of maternal duty. With the exception of the Jean-Jacques Rousseau novel, the texts I discuss are written by English authors and centre on maternal affection or the lack thereof. The thesis continues by examining Daniel Defoe‘s Moll Flanders and Roxana. Both these novels reflect the conditions of poor and destitute mothers in eighteenth-century society, who are precariously positioned regarding their children. Eliza Haywood‘s Anti-Pamela, the antidote to Pamela, concentrates on the conduct of a mother who was a defective role model for her daughter. The thesis moves on to examine the novels of Samuel Richardson: Pamela I and II, Clarissa and Sir Charles Grandison, novels that concentrate on the dynamics within various families with the emphasis placed on the Page v role and behaviour of the mother. Richardson‘s women have pre-ordained roles in the society in which some of the female characters embody discourses of ideal motherhood. The following chapter analyses Jean-Jacques Rousseau‘s Émile and Julie, ou la Nouvelle Héloïse with his didactic tone and his appeals to mothers. The thesis concentrates on the authors‘ perspective and contemporary opinions of motherhood. The novels used within this study all differ in characters and outcome. Page vi INTRODUCTION Page 1 In the early 1980s, New Historicism and Cultural Materialism emerged as important literary theoretical traditions and began to signify a revitalization of interest in history and historicizing history in literature. Advocates of these theories identified new methods of reading literature relating to history and politics while renouncing formalist criticism and previous procedures of reading literature within its historical framework. These theories are aimed at returning and renewing our images of the past. They refuse to detach literature from larger cultural debts and aspire to outline how previous eras had their own theoretical and ideological contexts which would be different to modern day concepts; societies of earlier periods would have had very dissimilar perceptions of gender, religion, reality and human nature than today‘s society. Cultural materialism intends to show that within our social and ideological organization texts can be construed from different perspectives by positioning them in their historical environment. John Brannigan describes cultural materialism thus: New historicism and cultural materialism share a common preoccupation with the relationship between literature and history, and share an understanding of texts of all kinds as both products and functional components of social and political formations. Where many previous critical approaches to literary texts assumed that texts had some universal significance and essential ahistorical truth to impart, new historicist and cultural materialist critics tend to read literary texts as material products of specific historical conditions. Both theories approach the relationship between text and context with an urgent attention to the political ramifications of literary interpretation. In the eyes of new historicist and cultural materialist critics, texts of all kinds are the vehicles of politics insofar as texts mediate the fabric of social, political and cultural formations.1 Politically, New Historicist and Cultural Materialist critics are keen to recapture misplaced history and to investigate methods of social subjugation. New Historicists are more disposed to focus on the higher rungs of the social ladder such as the monarchy, the church and the upper classes, focusing on political science and anthropological 1 See John Brannigan, New Historicism and Cultural Materialism (New York: St. Martin‘s Press, 1998), p. 3. Page 2 perspectives with their concentration on authority, political and social institutions and culture. Cultural Materialists centre on the other end of the social scale with its emphasis on the lower-classes; women and others with little influence or power, depending on sociology and economics with the stress on the marginalized, finance and commerce.2 The principle purpose of historicism and cultural materialism is the analysis of literature within history, not literature and its history. This is to perceive literature as a vital and powerful component in the creation of history and consequently inconsistencies and challenges of so called artistic influence are endemic.3 Graham Holderness has described cultural materialism as a ‗politicized form of historiography,‘ with its determination on the significance of commitment with concerns about class, race, gender and sexuality. Alan Sinfield and Jonathan Dollimore in the 1990s identified cultural materialism as a select critical theory that contained four characteristics, namely: historical context, theoretical method, political commitment and textual analysis.4 Stephen Greenblatt remains the most famous critic
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