Why Novels Make Bad Mothers

Abstract

At beginning of nineteenth century, various influential were engaged in project of defining the as literary form and establishing canon for genre. In process of doing so, they defined novel as writing-a definition by no means obvious from survey of most prominent novelists of late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Burney, Radcliffe, and Edgeworth were then widely acknowledged as authoritative practitioners of form, commanding respect from critical establishment as well as inspiring schools of imitators. The status of women novelists, however, altered quite abruptly in 1810s. The early novel criticism of that powerful literary arbiter, The Edinburgh Review, reflects (and helped to effect) that change of climate ... for women writers (Johnson xv). From its inception in 1802, quarterly reviewed very few novels as part of its effort to set tone superior to that of other reviews. But all fiction Edinburgh did review until 1814 was written by womenamong them, Elizabeth Hamilton, Amelia Opie, Hannah More, and, most notably, Maria Edgeworth. The Edinburgh singles her out for high praise, promoting her novels' didactic authority. A review of Waverly in November 1814 issue marks beginning of Scott's rise to dominance. The critical turning point, however, is an article in next issue listed in table of contents as review of Burney's The Wanderer. But page header throughout article, which gives The Wanderer short shrift, is Standard Novels and Romances. This essay on genre defines canon as male, naming Richardson, Fielding, Smollett, and Sterne great British artists of form. The writer downplays contributions of such female authors as Radcliffe and Burney; indeed, one of Burney's weaknesses as novelist is that she writes as a very (336). Even Edgeworth, former favorite, is relegated to insignificance of woman writer. From this point on, Edinburgh treats her work less respectfully, and it is Scott and Maturin who dominate quarterly's fiction reviews into 1820s. This essay gives reading of an almost-forgotten work that supplies special insight into cultural logic of redefinition of novel as preserve of masculine authority at crucial point in formation of early novel canon. Eaton Stannard Barrett's The Heroine, first published in 1813, is an energetic burlesque of sentimental and gothic novels so popular-and so strongly associated with women and readers-in late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. The book's protagonist, Cherry Wilkinson, dissatisfied with comfortable routine of her life as daughter of solid country squire, rechristens herself Cherubina de Willoughby and sets out for adventures of heroine. A resourceful young woman, she generally finds----or fabricates-what she is looking for. In book's central episode, however, she meets with shocking disappointment. Thrilled by mysterious note informing