The value of Youngkin’s book manifests in her astute reading of feminist realism during the late-Victorian period. Her presentation of women in a variety of texts, along with her examination of Shafts and The Woman’s Herald, provides a complex yet unabstruse survey of the ways in which writers at the fin de siècle achieved the feminist realist aesthetic. Youngkin briefly defines her contentions in the Introduction and astutely reinforces them throughout the entire work, developing and applying each assumption with clarity and definitive evidence. Her focus on consciousness, in particular, and the narrative devices used to express a character’s introspection generates a connection between the Victorian and modernist novel, which, in turn, elucidates the simultaneous transition from and retention of realism in the modernist text. In this impressive first book, one certainly discovers a myriad of innovative and intelligent reflections on a wide panoply of novels.

 

ES: Your analysis of Feminist Realism and its relationship with women’s press at the fin de siècle is intriguing. I admire the ways in which you’ve created a bridge between Victorian and Modern literature vis-à-vis your examination of the feminist realist aesthetic, and, in particular, through your evaluation of female and male authors who have written with the “Woman Question” in mind. What sparked your interest in Victorian realism and the feminist realist ideal? Did you read a particular book or publication that instigated your curiosity?

 

MY: My interest was sparked while working on my master’s degree in English at Wright State University. One summer, I took a course called “The Fallen Woman in Victorian Literature and Art” with Dr. Peter Bracher, and we read George Moore’sEsther Waters.  I remember being just enthralled with the way in which Moore presented the story of an independent-minded female servant who becomes pregnant but overcomes the stigma of being a single mother, and when it came time for me to write my master’s thesis, I chose to write about this novel.  That master’s thesis grew into a Ph.D. dissertation about how male authors wrote about female characters in the 1890s, and the dissertation grew into this book. It’s amazing how one book can be the impetus for something much larger. That’s certainly what happened with me and Esther Waters. 

 

ES: Do you think the women editing and writing for Shafts and The Woman’s Herald, for instance, were consciously aware that they were contributing to a reactionary cause, or movement; or, do you think they critiqued and wrote about feminist characters and narratives because of an unconscious, internal identification with feminist characters?

 

MY: It’s probably a bit of both.  It’s clear from the contents of Shafts and The Woman’s Herald that the book reviews that appeared in these journals were part of a larger set of materials that focused on women’s issues in a variety of different contexts (legislative, economic, and cultural, as well as literary and artistic), so I think the women who wrote the book reviews did see themselves as part of a larger movement. Florence Fenwick Miller, who wrote the review of Esther Waters forThe Woman’s Herald, is a good example.  She is best known for her involvement in the suffrage movement, and writing about literature was just one way to contribute to the larger movement.  Still, the reviews in these two journals also indicate that reviewers were drawn to the books they analyzed in the first place because they felt a personal identification with the characters.  So, both things—a conscious effort to participate in a broader movement and a perhaps more unconscious investment in the literature—seem to be at work. 

 

ES: Do you see any movement now that parallels the feminist realist ideal of the Victorian period? Do you see this ideal emerging within feminism in the Middle East, or anywhere else in the world?

 

MY: That’s a good question.  On the one hand, the changes in literary style over the course of the 20^th century means that realistic representation is valued less now than it was in the Victorian period.  On the other hand, I find that women readers—from all different backgrounds—still want to read books that reflect the difficult social conditions women face and illustrate how they survive and overcome these conditions. So, although realism may not be the favored literary style in the early 21^st century, there is still an interest in it among many women readers.  As long as women are interested in their own agency, I think they will be interested in something akin to feminist realism.

 

ES: Do you plan to continue writing about these issues in Victorian literature? Perhaps, from other critical perspectives, such as a psychoanalytic literary approach?

 

MY: My approach tends to be primarily historical, and I also incorporate narrative theory into my analysis, so I’m not sure that psychoanalysis is a likely choice for me in my future work. However, I found Judith Butler’s book The Psychic Life of Power, which takes up the issue of how to reconcile psychoanalysis with a poststructuralist view of the subject as determined by cultural forces, really fascinating. Butler seems to carve out a space for discussing the impact of cultural forces on the inner life of a person that psychoanalysis is so concerned with, and that was helpful to me in terms of thinking about how feminist theorists, especially first- and second-wave feminists, also were concerned about the individual’s psychological experience in a way pure poststructuralists cannot be, by virtue of their emphasis on the limitations placed on individual subjects by cultural forces. Butler, as a third-wave feminist who embraced poststructuralism, is able to address issues that first- and second-wave feminists could not.