This investigation presents two literary case studies that demonstrate the heterogeneity of Wilhelmine popular fiction, both in terms of thematic orientation and aesthetic quality. The chosen authors are women from bourgeois backgrounds who were prolific and well-known during their life-time, but who have since been relegated. They target the ‘new middle class’ of that era as their readership and, respectively, represent two important but contested genres of late nineteenth-century popular fiction: Heimatkunst and the Sozialroman. Heimatkunst has been dismissed as a homogeneous propagator of right-wing ideology. Yet the texts of Charlotte Niese evidence ‘resistant practice’ within and against prevailing discourse parameters. Her autobiographical writing demonstrates a type of nationalism orientated in dignity and independence, rather than competition and militarism, while also showing how political indoctrination and imposition poisoned the vernacular social status quo which otherwise managed to integrate antagonistic values and attitudes. Her fictional narratives highlight how writing dubbed Heimatkunst was subject to hybridisation, at times to amount to an approximation of a modernist aesthetic. The Sozialroman has been dismissed as a trivial ‘variety of social recipes’. Luise Westkirch’s narratives, however, incorporate thorough-going social reform. Her shorter narratives include astute, psychologically-based social critique which facilitates insights into contemporaneous preoccupations and slow perceptual changes. Incorporating tenets derived from the German romantic legacy, her narratives challenge dominant discourse parameters directly. In the process, the internationally ubiquitous interpretation of competition and power as basic instinctual drives is deconstructed as an erroneous and self-destructive assumption. Westkirch’s complex narratives establish sub-textual agendas through ‘thematic compounding’ that directs the reader’s attention overtly at one set of issues while covertly commenting on another. In this way, she constructs gender inequality as an indictment of normative socio-political systems. This study therefore argues that popular fiction located in a time of cultural crisis has the potential to make explicit the parameters of the prevailing dominant discourse, against which specific values are articulated. Since a conscious formulation of these parameters is essential to the loosening of any conceptual hegemony, which depends on implicitness, fiction thus situated can yield new perspectives, not only in terms of historical insight, but in terms of conceptual alternatives that also have contemporary relevance.

Throughout the history of art, the pastel medium has been considered a medium of secondary interest. Despite its pulsating textures, vibrant colors, and unique receptivity to touch, this medium has been recognized above all for its swiftness in stroke and subsequent ability of the artist to record images of fleeting moments and ideas almost instantaneously. The focus on the advantageous rapidity of the pastel, however, hindered the pastel medium's potential as a mere preliminary technique to working with grander mediums, such as oil paint, thus failing to recognize the prominence of pastel in capturing character. This research endeavor focuses on a very specific era with comparably high usage of pastel-- late nineteenth-century Paris--and the distinctive characteristic that defines said era--the hyper-sexuality of the Parisian prostitute. The eminent presence of prostitution and the consequential iconography of female sexuality in late nineteenth-century Paris defined the world of French Bohemia and seeped into the artistic exchange of the era. Although holding a traditionally subsidiary position to other historically primary mediums, the pastel medium prevailed in communicating the sexuality, sensuality, and promiscuity of the sinful female in Paris at the close of the century. The pastel works of prominent artists in the nightlife milieu such as Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and Edgar Degas which revolve around the theme of prostitution serve as key illustrations of the distinctive ability of the ephemeral medium to capture the mood and personality--and therefore the sensual quintessence--of its subject. Through contextual and visual analysis, this research endeavor thus ultimately aims to lift the traditionally secondary pastel medium to one of impressive proportions, emphasizing its unique advantages and raising its overall credence.

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Jacques-Émile Blanche (1861-1942) is rarely included in histories of late nineteenth-century French art, despite his prolific career as an artist who produced over 2,000 paintings. A portraitist, Blanche’s upbringing as the son of an eminent psychiatrist provided him with a wealth of sitters connected to his father’s fashionable clinic and, I argue, a distinctive approach to their representation. These relatively unstudied portraits of famous Parisian intellectuals and socialites deserve our attention as works of ‘psychological impressionism’. Combining penetrating observation with painterly execution, Blanche’s methods emphasised the ‘nervous’ disposition of his sitters. Blanche’s practice as a portraitist is one of the reasons for his neglect. His contemporaries were evasive when it came to writing about the genre, uncertain of how to evaluate it – a critical apprehension that has persisted to this day. Art historians are as implicated in what may be thought of as a hesitation around the status and significance of portraiture in late-nineteenth-century French art. The thesis seeks in part to redress this through its examination of Blanche’s portraits as intuitive works of art that not only reflected but also, more actively, produced particular forms of knowledge about the ‘nervous’ condition of Parisian high society. With a focus on Blanche’s depictions of Marcel Proust (1871-1922) and the Comtesse de Castiglione (1837-1899), the thesis considers Blanche’s ‘neurasthenic portraits’ in relation to discourses on modern psychiatry, modernity, and modern art, drawing attention to how they enrich our understanding of the social, cultural and artistic contexts in which Blanche lived and worked. By situating Blanche’s artistic practice within his father’s clinical practice, and by embracing a methodology that draws upon both the histories of art and psychiatry, I argue that the language of Blanche’s portraiture was environmentally connected to the language of nervous disorder. As such this thesis will provide an original contribution to the scholarship on Blanche and offer significant insights into the entanglement of art, culture and nerves in nineteenth-century Paris.

The thesis is a critical reading of pedagogical and biographical texts by and on violinists, written in the early twentieth century. It contributes to historical and discursive studies by providing a limited engagement with a largely neglected group of historical sources relating to musical performance, and further advances the historical research on subjectivity, the body, pathology, and erotics, in relation to discourses of music. The thesis also contributes to studies of performance practice, and empirical and psychological studies of musical performance, in that it engages with discursive notions of theoretical and performance categories, such as tempo, melody, vibrato and portamento. By taking a hermeneutic approach to detailed discussions of performative practices, primarily found in pedagogical texts, the project aims to provide a more nuanced assessment of many of the topics that have played a central role in the ongoing research on early twentieth-century performance (which principally consists of recordings analysis). The project does this by demonstrating the extent to which these practices are culturally and historically mediated. Following an introduction, chapter 2 demonstrates that notions of consciousness inform writers’ notions of musical virtuosity, and shows that Nietzschean and Wagnerian notions of self underpin the idea of the violinist as a superior producer of art. Chapter 3 argues that these ideas combine with metaphysical notions of melody to make the concept of ‘tone’/Ton the cornerstone of string playing during this period, which in turn has important implications for how writers conceive of tempo, rhythm, vibrato, portamento and dynamics. Chapter 4 demonstrates that writers perceive their ideal of tone to be threatened by moral and physiological disease, manifested in individual/social bodies, which leads to a very different articulation of these same practices. Chapter 5 explores traces of notions of intersubjectivity, arising from metaphors of erotic desire, which challenge the hegemonic ideal of universal mind. The conclusion frames the discourse as a problematic attempt to posit an authoritarian model of string playing. It also includes a preliminary study of early twentieth-century discourses of cello playing, and engages with the research to date on national styles of violin playing in the same period.

This thesis examines the development of the soldier in late-Victorian Britain in light of the movement to rehabilitate the public image of the ordinary ranks initiated by the Cardwell-Childers Reforms. Venerated in popular culture, Tommy Atkins became a symbol of British imperial strength and heroism. Socially, however, attitudes to the rank-and-file were defined by a pragmatic realism purged of such sentiments, the likes of which would characterise the British public’s relationship with their army for over thirty years. Scholars of both imperial culture and the Victorian military have identified this dual persona of Tommy Atkins, however, a dedicated study into the true nature of the soldier’s position has yet to be undertaken. The following research will seek to redress this omission. The soldier is approached through the perspective of three key influences which defined his development. The first influence, the politics of the War Office, exposes a progressive series of schemes which, cultivated for over a decade, sought to redefine the soldier through the popularisation of military service and the professionalisation of the military’s public relations strategy and apparatus. A forgotten component of the Cardwell-Childers Reforms, the schemes have not before been scrutinised. Despite the ingenuity of the schemes devised, the social rehabilitation of the soldier failed, primarily, it will be argued, because the government refused to improve his pay. The public’s response to the Cardwell-Childers Reforms and the British perception of the ordinary soldier in the decades following their introduction form the second perspective. Through surveys of the local and London press and mainstream literature, it is demonstrated the soldier, in part as a result of the reforms, underwent a social transition, precipitated by his entering the public consciousness and encouraged by a resulting fascination in the military life. The final perspective presented in this thesis is from within the rank-and-file itself. Through the examination of specialist newspaper, diary and memoir material the direct experiences of the soldiers themselves are explored. Amid the extensive public and political discussion of their nature and status, the soldier also engaged in the debate. The perspective of the rank-and-file provides direct context for the established perspectives of the British public and the War Office, but also highlights how the soldier both supported and opposed the reforms and was acutely aware of the social status he possessed. This thesis will examine the public and political treatment of the soldier in the late-nineteenth century and question how far the conflicting ideas of soldier-hero and soldier-beggar were reconciled.

During the twenty first century the enthusiasm among the general public the turn of the century 1900’s kitchen has increased in Sweden. Since around 2010 media is overflowing of imagery that cater to and perhaps even with an intention to further stimulate interest in the century 1900’s kitchens. The wallcovering plays a huge part in achieving that estetic. With the increase of serious interest in properly reconstructing and rebuilding these kinds of spaces the scientifically based conservation is vital. But how accurate is the public picture of the turn of the century 1900’s kitchen? How accurate is even the more academically recognized image of the kitchen in Sweden between 1890 to 1920? With this thesis, my intention is to expand the view and knowledge regarding wall coverings in the private kitchens in Sweden between 1890 - 1920. Also to increase underlying information to proper conservation for buildings. The knowledge in both private and state funded conservation in this aspect is, according to findings during the course of writing this thesis, is lacking due to the spars scholar level interest in this subject. This bachelor thesis purpose is to contribute to the advancement of scientifically based knowledge of the private kitchen wallcovering between 1890-1920 in Sweden and compare the popularized image of the kitchen wallcovering, with the result from my study. With different types of archive material, both figurative and written, this bachelor thesis aim at broadening the popularized image of the wallcovering in Sweden's home kitchens between the years 1890-1920. Iconology/iconography, conservation, pop culture and feminist theories have been considered when making this thesis. One among several findings, as presented in this thesis, is that the popularized image of wall covers in home kitchens in Sweden between the years of 1890-1920 differs significantly from their usual appearance.