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andreablythe's review against another edition
5.0
In Between Women, Sharon Marcus aims to disprove the misconception that female friendship, desire, and marriage were not contrary to heterosexual relations in Victorian England, as well as to show that "the asexual Victorian woman able only to respond to male advances is a myth -- not a Victorian myth, but our own."
She presents three forms of female relationships. The first is female friendship, which was considered to be an important aspect of a woman's education in feminity. It was important in the Victorian era that a woman maintain friendships with other women, friendships that were intimate and passionate (but nonsexual), otherwise she may be deemed unwomanly by her lack of such friendship. In fact, Marcus shows how female friendship was vital to a successful marriage instead of opposed to it, and presents several novel plots in which the happy marriage at the end would not have been possible without female friendship.
The second form of relations involves female desire, namely in the eroticised figures of fashion plates and dolls. Marcus presents evidence that rather than being simply an objectification of women for male desires, fashion plates and dolls were meant primarily to represent and avenue for female enjoyment and pleasure.
The third relationship form she looks at are female marriages, in which two women merge their housholds, will their property to their partner, and behave in the same way as any married couple. Marcus shows these marriages were not the antithesis of heterosexual marriage, but an acceptable alternative to it. Women in female marriages were not outcastes, but for the most part accepted as couples in certain circles of society. And in fact it was partially the example of female marriage as contractual that aided in the reform of heterosexual marriages.
This book was a fascinating reading, opening my mind to new perspectives about Victorian England. Looking back on the past, it is easy to generalize, often to the result that some aspect of history and culture gets ignored in trying to define it. This book is a reminder that one should not assume that everyone bevaed a certain way in the past, and that culture is as infinitly complicated as in our every day lives.
I would certainly recomend this book to anyone interested in Victorian history.
She presents three forms of female relationships. The first is female friendship, which was considered to be an important aspect of a woman's education in feminity. It was important in the Victorian era that a woman maintain friendships with other women, friendships that were intimate and passionate (but nonsexual), otherwise she may be deemed unwomanly by her lack of such friendship. In fact, Marcus shows how female friendship was vital to a successful marriage instead of opposed to it, and presents several novel plots in which the happy marriage at the end would not have been possible without female friendship.
The second form of relations involves female desire, namely in the eroticised figures of fashion plates and dolls. Marcus presents evidence that rather than being simply an objectification of women for male desires, fashion plates and dolls were meant primarily to represent and avenue for female enjoyment and pleasure.
The third relationship form she looks at are female marriages, in which two women merge their housholds, will their property to their partner, and behave in the same way as any married couple. Marcus shows these marriages were not the antithesis of heterosexual marriage, but an acceptable alternative to it. Women in female marriages were not outcastes, but for the most part accepted as couples in certain circles of society. And in fact it was partially the example of female marriage as contractual that aided in the reform of heterosexual marriages.
This book was a fascinating reading, opening my mind to new perspectives about Victorian England. Looking back on the past, it is easy to generalize, often to the result that some aspect of history and culture gets ignored in trying to define it. This book is a reminder that one should not assume that everyone bevaed a certain way in the past, and that culture is as infinitly complicated as in our every day lives.
I would certainly recomend this book to anyone interested in Victorian history.
sophronisba's review against another edition
3.0
I didn't quite finish this because I haven't read the Trollope novel she writes about at the very end and I didn't want to spoil myself.
I found the first third of the book insightful and useful, the rest less so. My perspective may be colored somewhat by the fact that I am reading for research purposes and the first third was much more relevant to what I'm working on. The final section, about female (same-sex) marriage in the Victorian era, was interesting and definitely piqued my curiosity because I didn't really know anything about it, but I felt that her treatment of it was a bit scattershot.
I found the first third of the book insightful and useful, the rest less so. My perspective may be colored somewhat by the fact that I am reading for research purposes and the first third was much more relevant to what I'm working on. The final section, about female (same-sex) marriage in the Victorian era, was interesting and definitely piqued my curiosity because I didn't really know anything about it, but I felt that her treatment of it was a bit scattershot.
evewithanapple's review against another edition
2.0
I have no idea what I just read.
I mean, okay, I get that her basic premise was "we assume that lesbianism was taboo/not thought of in Victorian society, but actually things were more complicated!" But even after reading the book, I don't know how she came to that conclusion. She offers up examples (little girls and their dolls, lesbian couples advocating for marriage reform, the Estella/Miss Havisham subtext in Great Expectations) but the writing was so dense and academic, I couldn't make heads or tails of what these examples were supposed to mean or how they supported her thesis. Like, in the conclusion, she says (paraphrased) "people hold up Oscar Wilde as an example of how homosexuality and heterosexuality were at odds in Victorian society, but he wrote a lot about women's relationships with each other!" It's like a Mad Libs game: none of the conclusions match up with the evidence given in the previous paragraph.
I mean, okay, I get that her basic premise was "we assume that lesbianism was taboo/not thought of in Victorian society, but actually things were more complicated!" But even after reading the book, I don't know how she came to that conclusion. She offers up examples (little girls and their dolls, lesbian couples advocating for marriage reform, the Estella/Miss Havisham subtext in Great Expectations) but the writing was so dense and academic, I couldn't make heads or tails of what these examples were supposed to mean or how they supported her thesis. Like, in the conclusion, she says (paraphrased) "people hold up Oscar Wilde as an example of how homosexuality and heterosexuality were at odds in Victorian society, but he wrote a lot about women's relationships with each other!" It's like a Mad Libs game: none of the conclusions match up with the evidence given in the previous paragraph.
anubhaghoshal's review against another edition
4.0
A great book to aware yourself of the various feminist perspective in the victorian era
justabean_reads's review
4.0
Bit of a mixed bag, but the good far outweighed the tedious. I loved the insights into Victorian society's view and use of female bonds and relationships. Some of the early novel analysis was great, as was the fashion section and the first part of the female marriages.
The author is right, I really hadn't heard a lot of these relationships discussed before, especially not in a platonic context, and her points are well made and clear, to the point of seeming obvious once you've read them.
A few chapters, namely the ones on Great Expectations and Can You Forgive Her? tended to drag for me.
The author is right, I really hadn't heard a lot of these relationships discussed before, especially not in a platonic context, and her points are well made and clear, to the point of seeming obvious once you've read them.
A few chapters, namely the ones on Great Expectations and Can You Forgive Her? tended to drag for me.
pamrosenthal's review
5.0
I'm no professional, but this may be the best book of academic literary criticism I've ever read. It's definitely one of the most delightful. She writes like a dream -- with a wonderful knack for piling on the info and reasoning and then giving you the summary point as a well-formed witty, simple sentence.
Drawing upon a formidable depth of what she calls life-writings of Victorian women, interspersing it with fine, deft readings of Victorian novels -- and (this is really the fun part) digging into magazine writing, advice columns, fashion plates, porn, "doll fiction" (who knew?) -- Marcus takes a generation of late 20th century feminist scholarship, writing and feminist agendas about women's relationships during the Victorian era, gives it a good shake, and comes out with a reasoned, reasonable, convincing view of a set of complex dynamics.
Going beyond agendas while respecting the importance of agendas, she helps us see ourselves as well.
I'm not doing it justice. But I'll probably be back to try again.
Drawing upon a formidable depth of what she calls life-writings of Victorian women, interspersing it with fine, deft readings of Victorian novels -- and (this is really the fun part) digging into magazine writing, advice columns, fashion plates, porn, "doll fiction" (who knew?) -- Marcus takes a generation of late 20th century feminist scholarship, writing and feminist agendas about women's relationships during the Victorian era, gives it a good shake, and comes out with a reasoned, reasonable, convincing view of a set of complex dynamics.
Going beyond agendas while respecting the importance of agendas, she helps us see ourselves as well.
I'm not doing it justice. But I'll probably be back to try again.
caidyn's review
3.0
Don't get me wrong, this is a great book. As the title suggests, it goes into relationships women had with other women, from pure friendships as we define it today to the erotic or lesbian type that people don't really think happened in the Victorian period. There were many interesting points brought up throughout this book, and all of them made me think a bit. Loved the inclusion of so many different topics, although that did make the chapters lengthy and dragged a bit from time to time.
However, the reason why I bumped it down a star -- overall, I consider this a four star book, maybe more once I do more research into this period (I'm a Tudor era guy myself, not Victorian) -- is the "just readings" she included. They were close readings on different books from the Victorian period, including [b:Far from the Madding Crowd|31463|Far from the Madding Crowd |Thomas Hardy|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1388279695s/31463.jpg|914540], [b:Great Expectations|2623|Great Expectations|Charles Dickens|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1327920219s/2623.jpg|2612809], and [b:Can You Forgive Her?|374371|Can You Forgive Her? (Palliser, #1)|Anthony Trollope|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1357208740s/374371.jpg|141822] as ones that I remember being talked about at length. The reason why I bumped the star down is not because they were irrelevant, it's just because I have never read any of the three books and, I can tell you, reading them would have made it less dull and put it into context for me.
I fully intend to reread this book once I actually read the three books she really hammered home in terms of female friendships/marriages.
However, the reason why I bumped it down a star -- overall, I consider this a four star book, maybe more once I do more research into this period (I'm a Tudor era guy myself, not Victorian) -- is the "just readings" she included. They were close readings on different books from the Victorian period, including [b:Far from the Madding Crowd|31463|Far from the Madding Crowd |Thomas Hardy|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1388279695s/31463.jpg|914540], [b:Great Expectations|2623|Great Expectations|Charles Dickens|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1327920219s/2623.jpg|2612809], and [b:Can You Forgive Her?|374371|Can You Forgive Her? (Palliser, #1)|Anthony Trollope|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1357208740s/374371.jpg|141822] as ones that I remember being talked about at length. The reason why I bumped the star down is not because they were irrelevant, it's just because I have never read any of the three books and, I can tell you, reading them would have made it less dull and put it into context for me.
I fully intend to reread this book once I actually read the three books she really hammered home in terms of female friendships/marriages.
libs's review
4.0
Reading the whole book vastly enriched the assigned chapter but ... I'm not completely sold. Really nicely written though.
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