The Mountain Maidens
(1) Recovering Frances Ridley Havergal’s Alpine Cantata as a Protofeminist Utopian Rewriting of the Story of Woman’s Fall
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 21667959 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Cho Nancy Jiwon (corresponding author) |
| Year | 2020 |
| Volume | 25 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 25-50 |
| Publication date | 2020-06-30 |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Literature and Religion (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1229-5620 • E-ISSN: 2288-7652 |
| Publisher | The Korean Society for Literature and Religion (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.14376/lar.2020.25.2.25 |
| OpenAlex | W3043593794 |
| Language | EN |
This article explores Victorian hymn-writer Frances Ridley Havergal’s The Mountain Maidens, a twelve-page cantata, which was first published in Under the Surface (1874), and posthumously reprinted in Swiss Letters and Alpine Poems (1881). It argues that, within the context of Havergal’s life writings about her liberating mountaineering experiences on the Swiss Alps, the text can be understood as imaginatively engaging in Christian feminist utopian discourse. In particular, the Alps far removed from the confines of British culture allow for the envisaging of a separatist female world where women can enjoy active work, physical prowess, autonomy, solidarity, and heroism. Moreover, within this imagined world, the Judeo-Christian metanarrative of the Fall is revised, so that female lapse need not lead to disaster or the coming of a male savior. Instead, it envisions an alternative resolution where women can be their own redeemers saving each other in times of trouble
Art · Literature · Programming language · Rewriting · Computer Science · German Literature and Culture Studies · Historical Gender and Feminism Studies · Historical Studies on Reproduction, Gender, Health, and Societal Changes · Philosophy
| Highly cited | No |
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