"The prettiest little actress" : performance theory and Frances Burney's Evelina

UNCW Author/Contributor (non-UNCW co-authors, if there are any, appear on document)
Johanna J. Stevens (Creator)
Institution
The University of North Carolina Wilmington (UNCW )
Web Site: http://library.uncw.edu/
Advisor
Katherine Montwieler

Abstract: Due to the limited mobility of the young middle-class woman in the eighteenth century, her identity was mainly the construction of the male who wielded control over her body. That control within Evelina takes the form of financial support, social standing, and matrimonial appropriateness and availability. This thesis is a close examination of the varying ways in which the male figures of the novel exercise the power of this control over Evelina. This study thus concludes due to Evelina’s compulsory performances to the expectation of the male power figure that female identity within the eighteenth-century novel is the construction of the male.

Additional Information

Publication
Thesis
A Thesis Submitted to the University of North Carolina Wilmington in Partial Fulfillment Of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts
Language: English
Date: 2009
Keywords
Burney Fanny 1752-1840. Evelina--Criticism and interpretation
Subjects
Burney, Fanny, 1752-1840. Evelina -- Criticism and interpretation

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