Virtuous Victim or Sexual Predator?

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A01=Abigail Dunn
Abigail
Author_Abigail Dunn
Category=DSB
Category=DSBF
Category=DSBH
Category=JBSF1
eq_bestseller
eq_biography-true-stories
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
eq_society-politics

Product details

  • ISBN 9783034307765
  • Weight: 390g
  • Dimensions: 150 x 225mm
  • Publication Date: 18 Jul 2013
  • Publisher: Peter Lang AG, Internationaler Verlag der Wissenschaften
  • Publication City/Country: CH
  • Product Form: Paperback
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‘Was ist eine Witwe mehr als … ein aufgewärmtes Essen?’
According to politician and statesman Theodor Gottlieb von Hippel (1741-1796), widows were superfluous beings and second-hand goods, but they were also perceived by theologians and moralists of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries as a threat due to their sexual experience and supposedly ungovernable lust.
This book analyses the overwhelmingly negative portrayal of the widow in nineteenth- and early twentieth-century German fiction. Male writers in the works discussed repeat the theory that, once deprived of their husbands, widows become sexually voracious. Indeed, the widow is often presented as a dangerous sexual predator who is prone to violence. Female authors, however, highlight the invisibility of the widow and portray her as a figure alienated from society and her family because she has internalized the ideas propounded by Hippel. The widow is depicted throughout as a figure to be at best re-educated and at worst to be feared and guarded against.
Abigail Dunn currently teaches English Language at the University of Bonn. She obtained a D.Phil in German from the University of Oxford in 2009.

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