Roomscape: Women Writers in the British Museum from George Eliot to Virginia Woolf (Edinburgh Critical Studies in Victorian Culture)

This Book Examines The Reading Room Of The British Museum As A Space Of Imaginative And Historically Generative Potential In Relation To The Emergence Of Modern Women Writers In Victorian And Early Twentieth-century London. Drawing On Archival Materials Around This National Library Reading Room, Roomscape Is The First Study That Integrates Documentary, Theoretical, Historical, And Literary Sources To Examine The Significance Of This Public Interior Space For Women Writers And Their Treatment Of Reading And Writing Spaces In Literary Texts. This Book Challenges An Assessment Of The Reading Room Of The British Museum As A Bastion Of Class And Gender Privilege, An Image Firmly Established By Virginia Woolf's 1929 A Room Of One's Own And The Legions Of Feminist Scholarship That Uphold This Spatial Conceit.^ Susan David Bernstein Argues Not Only That The British Museum Reading Room Facilitated Various Practices Of Women's Literary Traditions, She Also Questions The Overdetermined Value Of Privacy And Autonomy In Constructions Of Female Authorship, A Principle Generated From Woolf's Feminist Manifesto. Rather Than Viewing Reading And Writing As Solitary, Individual Events, Roomscape Considers The Meaning Of Exteriority And The Public And Social And Gendered Dimensions Of Literary Production. In Addition To New Perspectives On George Eliot, Christina Rossetti, And Virginia Woolf, Roomscape Offers Original Research On Other Novelists, Poets, And Translators Including Amy Levy, Mathilde Blind, Eleanor Marx, Clementina Black, Constance Black Garnett, A. Mary F. Robinson, And Vernon Lee (violet Paget).^ Looking At The Reading Room Of The British Museum As A Networking Site For A Variety Of Readers, This Study Examines Political Radicals And Women Activists Who Found A Transnational Community In This London Public Space. An Appendix Of Notable Readers Lists Details Of More Than 200 Women Readers Who Registered For Admission To The Reading Room Of The British Museum From The Middle Of The Nineteenth Century Through The Early Twentieth Century. Exteriority : Women Readers At The British Museum -- Translation Work And Women's Labour From The British Museum -- Poetry In The Round : Mutual Mentorships -- Researching Romola : George Eliot And Dome Consciousness -- Reading Woolf's Roomscapes -- Coda : Closing Years And Afterlives -- Appendix : Notable Readers. Susan David Bernstein. Includes Bibliographical References (p. [212]-225) And Index. Examines the Reading Room of the British Museum using documentary, theoretical, historical, and literary sources Roomscape explores a specific site - the Reading Room of the British Museum - as a space of imaginative potential in relation to the emergence of modern women writers in Victorian and early twentieth-century London. Drawing on archival materials, Roomscape is the first study to integrate documentary, historical, and literary sources to examine the significance of this space and its resources for women who wrote translations, poetry, and fiction. This book challenges an assessment of the Reading Room of the British Museum as a bastion of class and gender privilege, an image established by Virginia Woolf's A Room of One's Own. Roomscape also questions the value of privacy and autonomy in constructions of female authorship. Rather than viewing reading and writing as solitary, Roomscape investigates the public, social, and spatial dimensions of literary production. The implications of this study reach into the current digital era and its transformations of practices of reading, writing, and archiving. Along with an appendix of notable readers at the British Museum from the last two centuries, the book contributes to scholarship on George Eliot, Amy Levy, Eleanor Marx, Clementina Black, Constance Black Garnett, Christina Rossetti, Mathilde Blind, and Virginia Woolf. Drawing on archival materials around this national library reading room, 'Roomscape' integrates documentary, theoretical historical, and literary sources to examine the significance of this public interior space for women writers and their treatment of reading and writing spaces in literary texts. This study challenges an assessment of the reading room of the British Museum as a bastion of class and gender privilege, an image firmly established by Virginia Woolf's 'A Room of One's Own' and the legions of feminist scholarship that upholds this spatial conceit COVER 1 Copyright 5 Contents 6 Figures 7 Series Editor’s Preface 8 Acknowledgements 10 Abbreviations 13 Chapter 1. Exteriority: Women Readers at the British Museum 14 Chapter 2. Translation Work and Women’s Labour from the British Museum 46 Chapter 3. Poetry in the Round: Mutual Mentorships 87 Chapter 4. Researching Romola: George Eliot and Dome Consciousness 126 Chapter 5. Reading Woolf’s Roomscapes 160 Coda: Closing Years and Afterlives 197 Appendix: Notable Readers 209 Bibliography 225 Index 239