Charles Dickens
The Woolf Afterlife
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 13008485 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Michael Hollington (University of Cambridge, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2020 |
| Volume | 10 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 292-310 |
| Publication date | 2020-11-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Victoriographies (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 2044-2416 • E-ISSN: 2044-2424 |
| Publisher | Edinburgh University Press (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.3366/vic.2020.0396 |
| OpenAlex | W3095590240 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 1 |
| References cited | 8 |
This essay begins with a survey of attitudes towards Charles Dickens in the extended Stephen family, as these were inherited by the modernist writer Virginia Woolf. On the one hand, there is the strongly negative view of her Uncle Fitzy (Sir James Fitzjames Stephen), and the lukewarm, rather condescending opinion of her father Leslie Stephen. On the other, there is the legacy of enthusiastic attention and appropriation from William Makepeace Thackeray's two daughters – her aunt Anne Thackeray Ritchie and (posthumously) Min, Leslie Stephen's first wife. In the second section I survey Woolf's critical writings on Dickens, adding a glance at the opinions of her husband Leonard. In both, there is an evolution towards greater attention and enthusiasm. Besides Woolf's familiar essay on David Copperfield (1849–50), I give prominence to lesser-known writings, in particular to her laudatory assessment and analysis of Bleak House (1852–3). The third and final part concerns signs of the influence of Dickens in Woolf's first novel, The Voyage Out (1915). The earlier, satiric part of the novel shows the impact both of Jane Austen and Dickens as ironists and humourists. During the tragic conclusion, influenced by a reading of Fyodor Dostoevsky, Jane Austen drops out, but Dickens is retained
Appropriation · Art · Art history · Aunt · Character (mathematics · Enthusiasm · Fyodor · Literature · Theology · Wife · Contemporary Literature and Criticism · Cultural Studies and Interdisciplinary Research · History · Modernist Literature and Criticism · Philosophy
| Citations per year | 0.2 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2021 - 2021 (1) |
| Highly cited | No |