A panoramic view of ‘the New Woman’ in Victorian literature (original) (raw)
RumeliDE Dil ve Edebiyat Araştırmaları Dergisi
The great social and cultural changes in the Victorian period had a great impact on gender roles. In both public and private sphere, the divisions in gender roles started to disappear with the emergence of a type of woman willing to be active in every area of life. Along with more frequent appearance and growing numbers of women in the work force through the late nineteenth century Elaine Showalter’s notion of “sexual anarchy” and its different forms were invigorated. How the social status of women started to change along with industrialization by the end of the nineteenth-century was also reflected upon Victorian literature. For instance, in Mrs Warren’s Profession the protagonist Vivie represents the new woman type who is ambitious to get education and to participate in work life as a self-sufficient woman in Victorian drama. When compared with the traditional woman type, she is more free-minded, independent and career-oriented. In D. H. Lawrence’ The Rainbow, Ursula, is another s...
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