Precocious Children and Childish Adults: Age Inversion in by Claudia Nelson

By Claudia Nelson

Especially obtrusive in Victorian-era writings is a rhetorical tendency to liken adults to little ones and youngsters to adults. Claudia Nelson examines this literary phenomenon and explores the ways that writers mentioned the child-adult dating in this period.

Though faraway from ubiquitous, the phrases "child-woman," "child-man," and "old-fashioned baby" look usually sufficient in Victorian writings to advised serious questions about the motivations and meanings of such generational border crossings. Nelson rigorously considers using those phrases and connects invocations of age inversion to advancements in post-Darwinian medical pondering and attitudes approximately gender roles, social classification, sexuality, strength, and fiscal mobility.

She brilliantly analyzes canonical works of Charles Dickens, Charlotte Brontë, William Makepeace Thackeray, Bram Stoker, and Robert Louis Stevenson along lesser-known writings to illustrate the range of literary age inversion and its profound impression on Victorian culture.

By contemplating the whole context of Victorian age inversion, Precocious childrens and infantile Adults illuminates the advanced development of hysteria and hope that creates such ambiguity within the writings of the time. students of Victorian literature and tradition, in addition to readers attracted to children’s literature, adolescence experiences, and gender reviews, will welcome this glorious paintings from an incredible determine within the field.

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