1st Edition
'Shall She Famish Then?' Female Food Refusal in Early Modern England
By Nancy A. Gutierrez
Copyright 2003
160 Pages
by
Routledge
160 Pages
by
Routledge
Also available as eBook on:
Nancy Gutierrez's exploration of female food refusal during the early modern period contributes to the ongoing conversation about female subjectivity and agency in a number of ways. She joins such scholars as Gail Kern Paster, Jonathan Sawday, and Michael Schoenfeldt, who locate early modern ideas of selfhood in the age's understanding of the body and bodily functions, that is, the recognition... Read more
Contents: Epigraph; Dedication; Preface; Contexts and methodologies; The public rendering of Margaret Ratcliffe's death; Fasting and prayer in A Woman Killed with Kindness: religious salvation and political resistance; 'Starved; starved': anatomy and food refusal in John Ford's The Broken Heart; 'The Maiden neither eate nor drank one morsel or droppe': miracle maidens as colonial objects; Epilogue: 'What, sir, ... can I do? I have no appetite'; Appendix I: Inscription on the tomb of Margaret Ratcliffe; Appendix II: The deaths of Queen Elizabeth I and Lady Arbella Stuart; Appendix III: Chronological listing of descriptions of Miracle Maidens, published in England 1589-1677; Bibliography; Index.
Biography
Nancy A. Gutierrez
'...surprises and convinces simultaneously. Finding examples in the popular drama, in pamphlet literature, and in accounts of historical figures, Gutierrez relates female food refusal to ideology, gender, and cultural struggle. What we have imagined a modern issue and named anorexia turns out to be a startling example of how deeply the roots of our own culture are embedded in the pre-modern world and, at the same time, of how great are the differences between the two. ... A fascinating and informative study of a struggle for control of the female body.' Barbara Traister, Professor of English, Lehigh University This interesting book charts important new ground by distinguishing the particular ambiguity of early modern cases of female food refusal (from medieval or modern ones). Its innovative focus opens up intriguing readings of new material and familiar texts, drawing on areas as diverse on post-colonial theory and early modern religious politics to offer analyses which are subtle and often surprising ... Gutierrez offers an important modification to gendered binary oppositions of active subject and passive object.' Alison Findlay, Reader in Renaissance Drama, University of Lancaster '... compelling study... Drawing on a wealth of diverse material, from pamphlets, dramatic literature, and private correspondence... ' Sixteenth Century Journal
