Masquerade and Civilization: The Carnivalesque in Eighteenth-Century English Culture and FictionStanford University Press, 1986 - 395 pages Public masquerades were a popular and controversial form of urban entertainment in England for most of the eighteenth century. They were held regularly in London and attended by hundreds, sometimes thousands, of people from all ranks of society who delighted in disguising themselves in fanciful costumes and masks and moving through crowds of strangers. The authors shows how the masquerade played a subversive role in the eighteenth-century imagination, and that it was persistently associated with the crossing of class and sexual boundaries, sexual freedom, the overthrow of decorum, and urban corruption. Authorities clearly saw it as a profound challenge to social order and persistently sought to suppress it. The book is in two parts. In the first, the author recreates the historical phenomenon of the English masquerade: the makeup of the crowds, the symbolic language of costume, and the various codes of verbal exchange, gesture, and sexual behavior. The second part analyzes contemporary literary representations of the masquerade, using novels by Richardson, Fielding, Burney, and Inchbald to show how the masquerade in fiction reflected the disruptive power it had in contemporary life. It also served as an indispensable plot-catalyst, generating the complications out of which the essential drama of the fiction emerged. An epilogue discusses the use of the masquerade as a literary device after the eighteenth century. The book contains some 40 illustrations. |
Contents
Travesty and the Fate of the Carnivalesque | 52 |
The Masquerade in English Fiction | 110 |
Richardsons Pamela Part 2 | 130 |
Fieldings Amelia | 177 |
Burneys Cecilia | 253 |
Inchbalds A Simple Story | 290 |
The Masquerade Topos After the Eighteenth Century | 331 |
Notes | 349 |
371 | |
Sources of Illustrations | 383 |
Other editions - View all
Masquerade and Civilization: The Carnivalesque in Eighteenth-century English ... Terry Castle No preview available - 1986 |
Masquerade and Civilization: The Carnivalesque in Eighteenth-century English ... Terry Castle No preview available - 1986 |
Common terms and phrases
allegorical ambiguous Amelia anti-masquerade appear Atkinson Bakhtin becomes Bennet's Booth Burney Burney's carnival carnivalesque Cecilia century character comic contemporary conventional Countess cultural Darnford Delvile didactic disguise domino Dorriforth dress dystopia eighteenth eighteenth-century masquerade Elmwood emblem English erotic fantasy female festive fictional world Fielding Fielding's figure Gentleman's Magazine Harrels Haymarket Heidegger heroine heroine's human ideological imagery imaginative Inchbald kind Lady's Magazine likewise literary London marriage masked assembly Masque masquer masquerade crowd masquerade episode masquerade scene masquerade topos masquerade's ment metamorphosis Miss Milner modern moral narcissism narrative narrator nature novel novelist occasion Pamela paradoxical pleasure plot popular psychological public masquerade querade Rabelais Ranelagh reader realm representation represented Richardson rituals role sartorial satiric saturnalia seems sense sequel set piece sexual Simple Story social suggests symbolic textual theme ticket tion Tom Jones topos traditional transformation transgressive transvestism travesties turn utopian Walpole Weekly Journal woman women writing