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A review by caidyn
Between Women: Friendship, Desire, and Marriage in Victorian England by Sharon Marcus
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.