I Know Well and Appreciate the Repose and Delight to Be Found in Gardening”
Class, Gender, and “Garden Elements” in Charles Dickens’s Dombey and Son
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 8864688 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Houliang Chen (0000-0002-4535-9899, Department of English, Huazhong University of Science and Technology Wuhan, China, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2024 |
| Volume | 105 |
| Issue | 7 |
| Pages | 1041-1055 |
| Publication date | 2024-07-25 |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | English Studies (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0013-838X • E-ISSN: 1744-4217 |
| Publisher | Routledge (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/0013838x.2024.2368967 |
| OpenAlex | W4400984283 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 9 |
Drawing upon Michael Waters's and Sarah Bilston's studies of Victorian literary representations of gardens, this article delves into scenes, activities, and imagery related to gardens and gardening in Charles Dickens's Dombey and Son. Examining these "garden elements" in the novel, it explores how seemingly apolitical garden scenes and gardening activities were embedded in Victorian schemas of gender and class configuration. Specifically, it analyses how Dickens skilfully exposes the unjust exploitation of women and the working class by a capitalist economy that prioritised the bourgeois male elite. The article argues that through his depiction of the transformative changes taking place in Staggs's Gardens, Dickens expresses a cautious optimism towards the emerging railway economy, subtly suggesting that it has the potential to benefit the working class and supplant the out-dated mercantile economy symbolised by Dombey
Aesthetics · Art · Art history · Class (philosophy · Epistemology · Sociology · Cultural Studies and Interdisciplinary Research · Decadence, Literature, and Society · Literature: history, themes, analysis · Philosophy
| Highly cited | No |
|---|