Keywords

Collins Gaskell Empire India Ngai Bennett

Abstract

The ubiquity of "things" in Victorian fiction tempts the reader to let them remain hidden in the domestic background, but in overlooking these objects both cultural context and historical meaning are lost. Elaine Freedgood's foundational work, The Ideas in Things, calls for a reading of objects in Victorian novels that follows them beyond the pages of the text; following this, I consider two specific objects of empire—diamonds and tea—in light of Jane Bennett's theory of vibrant matter, which posits that things engage with people in ways that "impede or block the will and designs" of humans and calls for a "cultivated, patient, sensory attentiveness to ... things and their affects" (xiv). Alongside Bennett, I employ Sianne Ngai's notion of ugly feelings to explore the affects that attach to diamonds and tea. Ngai argues that ugly feelings like envy, irritation, and boredom stall rather than instigate action and that their stagnating effects make them "far better suited to interpreting ongoing states of affairs" than bigger, louder affects such as fear and anger (27), allowing "texts to become ‘readable in new ways' and generate fresh examinations of historically tenacious problems" (8). My investigation of Wilkie Collins's The Moonstone (1868) and Elizabeth Gaskell's Cranford (1853) reads their objects as vibrant matter while attending to minor dysphoric affects running underneath the grander emotions of the narratives. Placing them in conversation with the periodical press and household manuals that sought to justify imperial control, I argue that the ugly feelings in these novels expose a fraying English moral fabric and undermine the framing of empire as a civilizing mission. By tracing currents of irritation and anxiety that circulate around the diamond in The Moonstone and by reading resignation and regret in the dregs of tea in Cranford, I uncover subtle critiques of empire.

Completion Date

2024

Semester

Spring

Committee Chair

Jones, Anna

Degree

Master of Arts (M.A.)

College

College of Arts and Humanities

Department

English

Degree Program

Literary, Cultural and Textual Studies

Format

application/pdf

Identifier

DP0028344

URL

https://purls.library.ucf.edu/go/DP0028344

Language

English

Rights

In copyright

Release Date

May 2029

Length of Campus-only Access

5 years

Access Status

Masters Thesis (Campus-only Access)

Campus Location

Orlando (Main) Campus

Accessibility Status

Meets minimum standards for ETDs/HUTs

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Restricted to the UCF community until May 2029; it will then be open access.

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