Home and Identity in Nineteenth-Century Literary London

Lisa C. Robertson is Lecturer in Women’s and Gender Studies at Acadia University in Wolfville, Nova Scotia. She is co-editor of Margaret Harkness: Writing Social Engagement, 1880–1921 (MUP, 2019).

• Acknowledgements List of Illustrations1. Housing Crisis: Home and Identity in Nineteenth-Century Literary London Part I: Structures of Authority: the Model Dwellings Movement2. ‘Out of its Torpid Misery’: Plotting Passivity in Margaret Harkness’s A City Girl (1887)3. ‘More Making the Best of It’: Living with Liberalism in Mary Ward’s Marcella (1894)4. Labour Leaders and Socialist Saviours: Individualism and Collectivism in Margaret Harkness’s George Eastmont, Wanderer (1905) Part II: Chambers, Lodgings, and Flats: Purpose-built Housing for Working Women5. Irritating Rules and Oppressive Officials: Convention and Innovation in Evelyn Sharp’s The Making of a Prig (1897)6. The Kailyard Comes to London: The Progressive Potential of Romantic Convention in Annie S. Swan’s A Victory Won (1895)7. Fugitive Living: Social Mobility and Domestic Space in Julia Frankau’s The Heart of a Child (1908)Part III: ‘Thinking Men’ and Thinking Women: Gender, Sexuality and Settlement Housing8. ‘Vital Friendship’: Sexual and Economic Ambivalence in Rhoda Broughton’s Dear Faustina (1897)9. ‘Twenty Girls in My Attic’: Spatial and Spiritual Conversion in L.T. Meade’s A Princess of the Gutter (1895)Part IV: Homes for a New Era: London Housing Past and Present10. ‘To Make a Garden of the Town’: the Nineteenth-Century Legacy of the Hampstead Garden Suburb Epilogue Bibliography Index

Lisa Robertson tells a compelling story about the late nineteenth century that still speaks to us today: about the relationship between literary representation, dwelling spaces, the city, women, community and class relations. She breathes new life into forgotten texts and conjures the experiments in living and new architectural models that inspired and were inspired by them.