Virginal Sexuality and Textuality in Victorian Literature

This book examines the figure of the virgin, a symbol central to many aspects of society and sexuality in nineteenth-century England, and its effects on the Victorian literary imagination. Studying the virgin as a social, sexual, and literary phenomenon, the volume contributes to current critical accounts of the relations among the body and language, gender, and discourse.
These essays explore the ways in which virginity is not a natural ideal but a complex cultural and literary sign. The authors rethink the virginal as a textual counter-example to the idealization of "natural sexuality."

About the author

Lloyd Davis is in the Department of English at the University of Queensland, Australia.

Product details

• Assisted by: Lloyd Davis (Editor)
• Publisher: State University of New York Press
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 24.12.1992
• EAN: 9780791412848
• ISBN: 978-0-7914-1284-8
• No. of pages: 257
• Dimensions: 157 mm x 229 mm x 1 mm
• Weight: 27 g
• Series: Suny Series, Body in Culture,; Suny Series, the Body in Cultu; Suny Series, Body in Culture,
• Subject: Humanities, art, music > Linguistics and literary studies > General and comparative literary studies