Mary Hays's The Victim of Prejudice1: Chastity ReNegotiated

Abstract

The article begins by looking at the rhetoric surrounding widespread notions of chastity as being protective, natural and the embodiment of virtue via its conflation with reputation. It then goes on to argue that Hays set out to challenge his configuration by separating female virtue from the presence of the hymen. Furthermore, The Victim of Prejudice dissects the consequent inevitability of ‘ruin’ after a seduction or rape by tracing the impact of a mother's ‘fall’ on the situation of the daughter. Hays's personal interest in determinism and cause and effect permits her to explore the implications behind this drama by allowing the daughter to refuse to accept the inevitability of ruin and to challenge the prejudices surrounding her illegitimacy. She attempts to become more than just the daughter of the mother and seeks to tell and live her own story. However, the pattern of telling inherent in the narrative structure ensures that a catastrophe is to be foreseen as the various stories impact upon each other. The daughter refuses to act out the traditional role of fallen woman and challenges, defiantly, the necessity to become socially invisible and submissive. The novel re-negotiates chastity, making it flexible and a manoeuvrable construct. The consequences of rape are shown to be based firmly on prejudices which, Hays argues, are constructed and, hence, removable. Thus Hays adds a new dimension to the novel of seduction and the supremacy of the social order.