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There remains in Hawthorne criticism today, despite critical rediscovery of his texts in terms of the public sphere, an echo of denunciation that he did not do the cultural work that his contemporaries did, that he "distrusted" and "punished" women, and that his work is irrelevant to today's young readers. He has been largely neglected, as well, by contemporary environmental critics who have found nature in his texts to be insufficiently mimetic. This ecocritical reading of Hawthorne in conjunction with that of Catharine Maria Sedgwick and Sarah Orne Jewett resolves these critical problems in that he is established as a nature writer, narratively rendering nature observation (sketches) and an environmental agenda (tales and novels) of expiation for maternal wilderness penetration. The all-important work of Hawthorne might then be called ecological, making him highly relevant in today's world. He is relevant in terms of women, as well, as nature unfolds in gendered terms in his works, and he, along with Sedgwick, positions the human female at scenes of primal violence at the heart of New England colonization, which set in motion the devastation of the American wilderness. Hawthorne's female is a corrective presence to which males remain blind. Jewett envisions a post-white-masculine-hegemonic world of female ascendancy, based on female symbiosis with nature, the fruition of Hawthorne and Sedgwick's preferencing of the female. Environmental criticism examines the human-nature relationships and ecological subtexts in literary texts and encompasses a critique of American culture, a gendered understanding of the landscape, an application of geographical discussion of place and of concepts from ecology and conservation biology. It employs a multi-disciplinary perspective and calls for the addition of "worldnature" or "environmentality" to the categories of cultural criticism. This ecocritical approach combines the historical philosophical, deconstructive, and psychoanalytic perspective of Patocka, Lacan, Derrida, and Staten with ecofeminism, integrating matters of geology, ecology, art, nature writing, and quantum mechanical physics. / English

This dissertation is a study of antebellum literature about the home and the post-Revolutionary conceptualization of domesticity as political participation. Analyzing texts that take the construction, management, and pursuit of a home as central concerns, I trace a cultural preoccupation with isolation in the idealization of the home. The cult of domesticity that emerged and was reflected in these texts was a troubled, conflicting response to the ideology of Republican Motherhood, which defined a woman's political contribution as raising good citizen sons and patriotic daughters. By taking a previously private role and turning it into a public duty, the mother became a highly visible and symbolically loaded figure. It also made her sphere of action, the home, a highly charged political space, subject to government intervention and social control. In conduct manuals, magazines, memoirs, and fiction, women writing about the home represent it as vulnerable to unwelcome intrusion, invasion, and influences, giving both power and critique to the ideal of home as isolated and pure, and, ultimately, attempting to reveal a domestic ideology that was at odds with Republican Motherhood and notions of liberal privacy that held the home to be a completely private, independent space. Tracing this tension in canonical and popular literature, I construct comparisons of texts not frequently put into conversation with each other, drawing provocative parallels and important distinctions between them and opening up scholarly understandings of domesticity with discussions of isolation and purity. Beginning with an analysis of domestic manuals by Catharine Beecher and Lydia Maria Child, I read these texts side by side with manuals on the construction of the asylum and penitentiary, which along with the home were built on models of isolation. These prescriptive texts attend obsessively to air purity and proper ventilation, and the figure of the nation's "inmate" emerges: a version of subjecthood in which self-development and redemption rely on an environment protected from all external influences (physical, political, economic, and social). Following this version of the ideal home as it plays out in the most popular women's magazine of the period, Godey's Lady's Book, I next examine how the figure of the child becomes a powerful symbol for vulnerability and freedom, unpacking the ways that sentimental rhetoric both served and failed the American homebuilding project. In the last two chapters, I analyze the female authors Caroline Kirkland and Fanny Fern and their attempts to transplant the American home to the West and the urban center, respectively. In A New Home, Who'll Follow?, Kirkland's "hut in the wilderness" becomes the best embodiment of the American Myth. Finally, in the autobiographical novel Ruth Hall and in her newspaper writings, Fanny Fern places her heroines "beyond the pale of female jurisdiction," rejecting the bonds of womanhood, but also revealing fears for the isolated woman and her potential for desolation and madness. Contextualizing Fern within the written output of maternal associations, I conclude with a consideration of the home as complex and multivalent: it is imagined as a space to work and a space free from work, a woman's empire and her prison, a place one desperately hopes to find and a place one wants to escape; the home is where one is free to be herself and where one is cut off and confined. / English

Current and historical methods of metric analysis often assume that the first beat of a metric group is stronger than the second. This, however, is not the case in all repertoires. For example, a study by William Rothstein (2011) demonstrates that Verdi’s midcentury operas often place emphasis on even-numbered beats. This paper shows this metric trend to be even more prevalent in a corpus of 208 nineteenth-century operatic excerpts, (1809-1859). I present a formal model that classifies phrases according to anacrusis length and prosodic accent, showing where large-scale metric accents fall within a phrase. This model produces three metric types which align with Rosthstein’s (2011) previous work. Compositional and historical features (e.g., language, premiere date, librettist, etc.) were tracked alongside type in order to determine whether preferences for certain metric forms were more prevalent in certain contexts. This indeed was the case. For instance, use of even-emphasis meter increases over time, even though odd-emphasis meter remains most common. Individual composers also show a significantly distinguishable preference toward each type of meter. These results not only confirm that the highest concentration of even-emphasis meter occurs in Verdi’s midcentury operas (Rothstein 2011), but that Verdi is the primary user of this type overall. I also demonstrate that language and composer nationality do not significantly affect an excerpt's metric type; only Verdi shows distinction in these areas. With this finding, I argue against using nationalist language to identify metric types and instead propose suggestions that better-reflect an updated understanding of nineteenth-century metric conventions.

Sir John Tenniel worked for the Victorian magazine Punch for over fifty years, from 1850 to 1901, and served as head cartoonist for the latter thirty-seven years of his tenure at the magazine. Tenniel's cartoons effectively became the heart of Punch's visual lineup, and the sentiments expressed by these cartoons both reflected and influenced the opinions of the magazine']s vast middle class readership. However, they did not generally reflect the opinions of the cartoonist himself: Tenniel had little to no say in decisions regarding the content or stance of his cartoons. The artist ostensibly had no problem with this arrangement, once telling a historian, "As for political opinions, I have none… [I] profess only those of my paper." This project argues that the artist did indeed inject a degree of personal opinion into his work, albeit in hidden and unconscious ways. Instead of using the medium of cartoons as an overt vehicle for his opinion, Tenniel's values and views come out in his use of iconography and his choice of models for his drawings. As a conservative Victorian man operating in the rapidly changing world of the latter nineteenth century, Tenniel used his drawings as a way to tap into the England of his youth and possibly reclaim the art world he originally studied to join as a young man. His iconography frequently looked back to medieval England, framing current events within these themes until the end of his career. Furthermore, Tenniel doggedly refused to update his mental drawing models for certain forms of technology, even when his depictions became obviously anachronistic. This thesis examines these tendencies through the threefold lenses of Material Culture Studies, Social Constructivism, and Nostalgia Studies in an attempt to link Tenniel's treatment of medieval iconography and depiction of modern technology with the nostalgic past. / Master of Arts

In the nineteenth century, amidst the rise of anti-Catholicism in the Western world, narratives served as a persuasive medium to influence the reading public. Anti-clerical sentiment was conveyed in various forms of text, often depicting the Catholic convent as a place of sinister confinement. This thesis offers an alternative representation of the French nineteenth-century convent. Considering the prevailing social, economic, and political environment in France, along with the conception of social space, I argue that the convent represents a place of sanctuary and opportunity for some women and girls. Further, in view of Victor Hugo's Les Misérables, I examine the representation of the convent as a place for rebirth. Likewise, in analyzing George Sand's autobiography Histoire de ma vie, I explore the representation of the convent as a haven for reviving creativity. Thus, by close reading and critical examination of these literary representations, I contend that the nineteenth-century convent can provide a place of refuge. / Master of Arts / Following the French Revolution of 1789, two opposing ideologies gathered momentum in France: monasticism and anti-clericalism. Beginning in 1815, enlistment of nuns in religious congregations doubled every fifteen years until the end of the century. During this period, anti-clericalism remained a potent political and social force. As with any institution of power, narratives served as a persuasive medium to influence the reading public. Anti-clerical sentiment was conveyed in various forms of text, often depicting the Catholic convent as a place of sinister confinement. These diverse depictions of the convent as a nefarious enclosure seem to contradict the growth and appeal of female religious orders during the epoch. This thesis offers an alternative representation of the French nineteenth-century convent. Partially owing to prevailing social, economic, and political structures that limited women's opportunities, convents attracted women from middle- or upper-class families who desired to serve in the public domains of healthcare and education. Considering this environment in France, along with the conception of social space, I argue that the convent represents a place of sanctuary and opportunity for some women and girls. Further, in view of Victor Hugo's Les Misérables, I examine the representation of the convent as a place for rebirth. Likewise, in analyzing George Sand's autobiography Histoire de ma vie, I explore the representation of the convent as a haven for reviving creativity. Thus, by close reading and critical examination of these literary representations, I contend that the nineteenth-century convent can provide a place of refuge.