Alternative Histories of the Self A Cultural History of Sexuality and Secrets, 1762-1917
Produktdetaljer
Biographical note
Anna Clark is Professor of History at the University of Minnesota, USA. She is the author of Desire: The History of European Sexuality (2008), Scandal: The Sexual Politics of the British Constitution (2004) and The Struggle for the Breeches: Gender and the Making of the British Working Class (1995).<i>Alternative Histories of the Self</i> is an excellent book, which has much to teach us about the power and pitfalls of the notion of a ‘unique’ personality. The chapters are well-written and engaging, and will appeal to academics and advanced students alike.
Theodore Koditschek, Professor Emeritus, University of Missouri, USA
Anna Clark’s engaging account of five extraordinary individuals vividly illustrates the exciting gains in suspending modern formulations of the self to gain historical knowledge of self-fashioning in the past. These case studies point to alternative modes of interiority available not to the many but to the few who dared to imagine themselves as unique in their body, gender or sexuality. This fascinating study of those rare exceptions to the rule deftly shows what’s possible when we approach the history of sexuality as a history of the self.
Laura Doan, Professor of Cultural History, University of Manchester, UK
[A] compelling close study of five key personalities, the Chevalier/Chevalière d’Éon, Anne Lister, Richard Johnson, James Hinton, and Edith Ellis, whose biographies are mapped against the radical rethinking of subjectivity that spanned the eras from Rousseau to Nietzsche.
Journal of the History of Sexuality