Haunting and Spectrality in Neo-Victorian Fiction: Possessing the Past [Hardcover]

Exploring the pervasive presence of the Victorian past in contemporary culture, these essays use the trope of haunting and spectrality as a critical tool with which to consider neo-Victorian works, as well as our ongoing fascination with the Victorians, combining original readings of well-known novels with engaging analyses of lesser-known works.Notes on Contributors Introduction; R.Arias?& P.Pulham PART I: HISTORIES?AND HAUNTINGS Salley Vickers, Venice, and the Victorians; F.O'Gorman Spectrality, S(p)ecularity and Textuality: Or, Some Reflections in the Glass; M.Llewellyn PART II:?SPECTRAL WOMEN Repetition and Eternity: Spectral and Textual Continuity in Mich?le Roberts' In the Red Kitchen ; A.Golda-Derejczyk The Maid, the Master, his Ghost and her Monster: Alias Grace and Mary Reilly ; E.Saxey PART III: SENSING?THE PAST Olfactory Ghosts: Michel Faber's The Crimson Petal and the White ; S.Colella The Haunting of Henry James: Jealous Ghosts, Affinities, and The Others; A.Heilmann PART IV: GHOSTS?IN?THE CITY Haunted Places, Haunted Spaces: The Spectral Return of Victorian London in Neo-Victorian Fiction; R.Arias Mapping Histories: The Golem and the Serial Killer in White Chappell , Scarlet Tracings and Dan Leno and the Limehouse Golem ; P.Pulham Bibliography Index

'...the editors ought to be congratulated on the high standard of the publication. It provides useful information on a wide-range of theories and neo-Victorian novels. Arias and Pulham have handsomely gathered eight essays which demonstrate the enormous critical potential of the tropes of haunting and spectrality in the field of Neo-Victorian Studies. Furthermore, the analysis of these tropes offered in the collection has proved to be a useful tool to expose and problematize both Victorian and contemporary gender, sexual, and social politics. It is for this reason that scholars engaged, not only with neo-Victorian fiction, but also with gender and trauma studies, should find this volume worth reló4