Virginal Sexuality and Textuality in Victorian Literature

Lloyd Davis is in the Department of English at the University of Queensland, Australia.

• Acknowledgments Part 1 Virginal Texts Chapter 1 The Virgin Body as Victorian Text: An IntroductionLloyd Davis Chapter 2 Virginal Sex, Vaginal Text: The "Folds" of FrankensteinGerhard Joseph Chapter 3 The Reader and the Virgin: What Next?L. J. Swingle Chapter 4 White Narratology: Gender and Reference in Wilkie Collins's The Woman in WhiteDiane Elam Part 2 Virginal Poeisis Chapter 5 Representation and Repristination: Virginity in The Ring and the BookHerbert F. Tucker Chapter 6 Becoming the Poet: The Feminine Poet-Speaker in the Work of Elizabeth Barrett BrowningDolores DeLuise with Michael Timko Chapter 7 The Frozen Fountain: Christina Rossetti, the Virgin Model, and Youthful Pre-RaphaelitismBarbara Garlick Chapter 8 Like a Virgin: Coventry Patmore's Still Unknown ErosJohn Maynard Part 3 Virgin de Siècle Chapter 9 What Lily Knew: Virginity in the 1890sAdrienne Auslander Munich Chapter 10 Confessing and Editing: The Politics of Purity in Hardy's TessSusan David Bernstein Chapter 11 Gender and Sexual Dis-Ease in DraculaJeffrey L. SpearChapter 12 "The Inner Chambers of All Nameless Sin": The Beetle, Gothic Female Sexuality, and Oriental BarbarismKelly Hurley Notes Contributors Index

"It collects some of the finest critics of Victorian literature; these critics interpret specific texts in ways illuminated by the shared emphasis on the centrality and paradoxicality of virginity. The topic is sexy, and interesting for that reason alone, and these authors are successful in doing the topic justice." — Lori Lefkovitz, Kenyon College