Sederi 28
Sederi 28 — 2018
EDITOR
Ana Sáez-Hidalgo
MANAGING EDITOR
Francisco J. Borge López
REVIEW EDITOR
María José Mora
ISSN 1135-7789
Margarete Rubik, “The house, the city, and the colony in the works of Aphra Behn: Gendered spaces and the freedoms and dangers they afford.” SEDERI 28 (2018): 55–78.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.34136/sederi.2018.3 Download PDF
Abstract
In Behn’s works the house affords no security for women, as men may force their way in, or relatives collude in the sexual violation of women. However, men, too, are threatened and cuckolded in their own houses. Not even convents are safe spaces for either sex. Outdoor spaces promise freedom from supervision but harbor threats to both women’s and men’s honor. The Whig inhabitants of the City of London are ridiculed, but female characters dabbling in politics are no more likeable, though Behn sympathizes with women claiming a right to public visibility. The racialized colonial space offers upward social mobility to Englishmen and –women, and to the latter also the freedom to partake in pastimes and occupations traditionally connoted as male.
Keywords: Aphra Behn; Restoration drama; gendering of spaces; spacial studies; women’s literature
References
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