Elizabeth Bowen and the Politics of Consent

2021 ◽  
Vol 51 (1) ◽  
pp. 24-39
Author(s):  
Kelly Sullivan
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Political Violence ◽  
The Political ◽  
Individual Rights ◽  
Elizabeth Bowen ◽  
World War Two ◽  
World War

As a novelist preoccupied with the sexualized gothic conventions haunting Irish fiction since the eighteenth century, Bowen persistently turns to the fraught concept of British and Irish women's consent during periods of twentieth-century political violence. This article considers Bowen's use of gothic tropes of consent in The Last September (1929) as well as a more sustained engagement with the Irish gothic, citizen-subjecthood, and the political valence of consent in her WWII thriller, The Heat of the Day (1948). It argues that in formulating consent in relation to knowledge, and in articulating the necessarily contractual nature of consent, Bowen seeks to define the ethics of individual rights and responsibility during and after World War Two.

The Gallic Singularity and the Royal Mistress

2020 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 44-66
Author(s):  
Christine Adams
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Soft Power ◽  
Political Power ◽  
The Political ◽  
Marie Antoinette ◽  
Louis Xvi ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Political Realm

The relationship of the French king and royal mistress, complementary but unequal, embodied the Gallic singularity; the royal mistress exercised a civilizing manner and the soft power of women on the king’s behalf. However, both her contemporaries and nineteenth- and early twentieth-century historians were uncomfortable with the mistress’s political power. Furthermore, paradoxical attitudes about French womanhood have led to analyses of her role that are often contradictory. Royal mistresses have simultaneously been celebrated for their civilizing effect in the realm of culture, chided for their frivolous expenditures on clothing and jewelry, and excoriated for their dangerous meddling in politics. Their increasing visibility in the political realm by the eighteenth century led many to blame Louis XV’s mistresses—along with Queen Marie-Antoinette, who exercised a similar influence over her husband, Louis XVI—for the degradation and eventual fall of the monarchy. This article reexamines the historiography of the royal mistress.

The Shaping of a Nation: Palestinians in the Last Century of Ottoman Rule

1994 ◽  
Vol 10 ◽  
pp. 75-94 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joel S. Migdal ◽  
Baruch Kimmerling
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
World War I ◽  
Social Boundaries ◽  
The Political ◽  
World War ◽  
British Mandate ◽  
Self Identity ◽  
British Rule ◽  
Political Boundaries ◽  
History Of

No period was more decisive in the modern history of Palestine than the British Mandate, which lasted from the end of World War I until 1948. Not only did British rule establish the political boundaries of Palestine, the new realities forced both Jews and Arabs in the country to redefine their social boundaries and self-identity. But the cataclysmic events that continued through 1948, with the creation of Israel and what Arabs called al-Nakba (the catastrophe of dispersal and exile), took shape in the wake of key changes stretching over the last century of Ottoman rule. What was to be Palestine after World War I became increasingly more integrated territorially during the nineteenth century. And Arab society in the last century of Ottoman rule underwent critical changes that paved the way for the emergence of a Palestinian people in the twentieth century.

‘The Lure of Pleasure’

2020 ◽  
pp. 73-90
Author(s):  
Sue Kennedy
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Young Woman ◽  
Married Woman ◽  
World War Two ◽  
World War ◽  
Counter Narrative ◽  
Good Mother

Sue Kennedy considers how Marghanita Laski’s provocative novel To Bed with Grand Music addresses the fantasy of fulfillable desires through the story of a young, married woman taking advantage of everything available in the ‘lucid abnormality’ of London during World War Two. This interfeminist counter-narrative of the protagonist’s libidinal life and her failure to perform as a good mother and faithful wife deviates from the propaganda of the People’s War rendering Laski’s undermining of this ideal at a raw moment in the nation’s psyche contentious. The essay considers the representation of the actions of a young woman and questions whether she is deserving of admiration or censure for her refusal to conform to expectations of feminine conduct. It suggests that her progress is in many ways more eighteenth than mid-twentieth century in tone presenting a woman who begins by embracing her own pleasure but later engages in ‘infamous commerce’.

Introduction

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-147
Author(s):  
Stephen Menn ◽  
Justin E. H. Smith
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Detailed Analysis ◽  
The Political ◽  
Medical Philosophy ◽  
Archival Documents ◽  
History Of ◽  
Intellectual Context ◽  
Academic Dissertations

The life of Anton Wilhelm Amo is summarized, with close attention to the archival documents that establish key moments in his biography. Next the history of Amo’s reception is considered, from the first summaries of his work in German periodicals during his lifetime, through his legacy in African nationalist thought in the twentieth century. Then the political and intellectual context at Halle is addressed, considering the likely influence on Amo’s work of Halle Pietism, of the local currents of medical philosophy as represented by Friedrich Hoffmann, and of legal thought as represented by Christian Thomasius. The legacy of major early modern philosophers, such as René Descartes and G. W. Leibniz, is also considered, in the aim of understanding how Amo himself might have understood them and how they might have shaped his work. Next a detailed analysis of the conventions of academic dissertations and disputations in early eighteenth-century Germany is provided, in order to better understand how these conventions give shape to Amo’s published works. Finally, ancient and modern debates on action and passion and on sensation are investigated, providing key context for the summary of the principal arguments of Amo’s two treatises, which are summarized in the final section of the introduction.

Union and its Challengers in the United Kingdom

2021 ◽  
pp. 21-36
Author(s):  
Michael Keating
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
United Kingdom ◽  
The State ◽  
Clear Distinction ◽  
World War Two ◽  
World War ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Parliamentary Sovereignty ◽  
Nineteenth And Twentieth Centuries ◽  
Over Time

The United Kingdom was created over time without a clear plan. Creation of the state largely coincided with the creation of the Empire so that there was not a clear distinction between the two. The union preserved many of the elements of the pre-union component parts, but was kept together by the principle of unitary parliamentary sovereignty. Within the union, the distinct nationalities developed in the modern period and produced nationalist movements. Most of these aimed at devolution within the state, but some demanded separation. Management of these demands was a key task of statecraft in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. In the post-World War Two era, the nationalities question appeared to have gone away but it returned in the 1970s. Devolution settlements at the end of the twentieth century represented a move to stabilize the union on new terms.

Continuity and Change in the Belfast Press, 1900–1994

2020 ◽  
pp. 377-395
Author(s):  
Nora Moroney ◽  
Stephen O’Neill
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Case Studies ◽  
The Political ◽  
World War ◽  
National Library ◽  
News Letter ◽  
Irish History ◽  
Continuity And Change ◽  
The World ◽  
The Creation

This chapter examines the political and textual transformations of the Belfast Telegraph, the Irish News, and the Belfast News Letter in the twentieth century. It discusses the creation and expression of separate forms of national and editorial identities in regard to the northern Unionist-leaning Telegraph and News Letter, and the nationalist Irish News. All three would eventually be transformed by their reportage of the World War, and the later Troubles. Describing the enduring popularity of all three papers as platforms for political expressions across the spectrum of twentieth century Irish history and politics, it argues that their longevity speaks to the success of their readjustments during these tumultuous years. Drawing on archives in the National Library of Ireland and the Belfast Central Library, the chapter includes case studies focusing on how each paper reported the failure of the Boundary Commission in 1925, the Belfast Blitz in 1941, and the IRA Ceasefire in 1994.

John Lehmann’s War Effort: The Penguin New Writing (1940–1950)

2020 ◽  
pp. 250-272
Author(s):  
Tessa Thorniley
Keyword(s):  
Short Stories ◽  
Short Story ◽  
Elizabeth Bowen ◽  
World War Two ◽  
World War ◽  
Graham Greene ◽  
Literary Periodicals ◽  
The World ◽  
War Effort ◽  
Rosamond Lehmann

John Lehmann’s The Penguin New Writing (1940-1950) is considered one of the finest literary periodicals of World War Two. The journal was committed to publishing writing about all aspects of wartime life, from the front lines to daily civilian struggles, by writers from around the world. It had an engaged readership and a high circulation. This chapter specifically considers Lehmann’s contribution to the wartime heyday for the short story form, through the example of The Penguin New Writing. By examining Lehmann’s editorial approach this chapter reveals the ways he actively engaged with his contributors, teasing and coaxing short stories out of them and contrasts this with the editorial style of Cyril Connolly at rival Horizon magazine. Stories by, and Lehmann’s interactions with, established writers such as Elizabeth Bowen, Henry Green and Rosamond Lehmann, the emerging writer William Sansom and working-class writers B.L Coombs and Jim Phelan, are the main focus of this chapter. The international outlook of the journal, which promoted satire from China alongside short, mocking works by Graham Greene, is also evaluated as an often overlooked aspect of Lehmann’s venture. Through the short stories and Lehmann’s editorials, this chapter traces how Lehmann sought to shape literature and to elevate the short story form. The chapter concludes by considering how the decline of the short story form in Britain from the 1950s onwards was closely linked to the demise of the magazines which had most actively supported it.

Reframing the Yenching Story

2007 ◽  
Vol 14 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 173-202 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philip West
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
World War I ◽  
Liberal Arts ◽  
The Political ◽  
World War ◽  
The Qing Dynasty ◽  
Opium War ◽  
Communist Revolution ◽  
Liberal Christianity ◽  
Unequal Treaties

AbstractOne way to revisit and reframe the Yenching story is to imagine with a few bold strokes how the conflicting threads in that story are woven into the ironic twists and turns in twentieth-century Chinese-Western relations. Had it not been for the political collapse of the Qing dynasty in 1911 and the cultural and spiritual vacuum created in its wake, core Chinese faculty at Yenching and many of the Yenching students might never have been attracted to liberal Christianity and the liberal arts. Had it not been for the extraterritorial protection under the unequal treaties going back to the days of the Opium War, it would not have been possible for the missionary educators to lead in introducing the liberal arts into China. Had it not been for the war with Japan and events leading up to it since World War I, followed later by the Chinese civil war, it would be difficult to explain to Western liberal ears how the patriotic passions of Yenching faculty and students could lead them to adapt as readily as they did to the Communist revolution.

The Royal Society, its Fellows and industrial R&D in the mid twentieth century

2010 ◽  
Vol 64 (suppl_1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sally M. Horrocks
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
Royal Society ◽  
New Products ◽  
The Political ◽  
World War ◽  
Institutional Contexts ◽  
Political Spectrum ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Over Time

Commentators and politicians have frequently argued that the performance of the British economy could be significantly improved by paying more attention to the translation of the results of scientific research into new products and processes. They have frequently suggested that deficiencies in achieving this are part of a long-standing national malaise and regularly point to a few well-worn examples to support their contention. What are conspicuous by their absence from these debates are detailed and contextual studies that actually examine the nature of the interactions between scientists and industry and how these changed over time. This paper provides one such study by examining three aspects of the relationship between the Royal Society, its Fellows and industrial R&D during the mid twentieth century. It looks first at the enthusiasm for industrial research to be found across the political spectrum after World War II before examining the election as Fellows of the Royal Society of men who worked in industry at the time of their election. Finally it considers the extent to which industrial R&D was incorporated into the way in which the Royal Society presented itself to the outside world through its Conversazione. Despite the absence of formal structures to translate the results of the work of scientists employed in other institutional contexts to industry, there is much evidence to indicate that there were plenty of other opportunities for the exchange of information to take place.

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