New Readings of Elizabeth von Arnim

Jennifer Shepherd is Senior Lecturer in the Department of English Literature and Creative Writing at The Open University. Jennifer was a founding member of the International Elizabeth von Arnim Society and serves on its steering group. Her research interests include women’s writing of the early twentieth century, especially as it relates to genre and material culture; the history of middlebrow culture; and discourses of ageing. She has published work on Elizabeth von Arnim, Edith Wharton, the New Woman, imperial romance novels and the history of the motoring movement. Noreen O’Connor is Professor of English at King’s College, Pennsylvania. Currently president of the International Elizabeth von Arnim Society, Noreen was a founding member of the society. She co-organized the joint Elizabeth von Arnim and Katherine Mansfield Conference, held in 2017 at the Huntington Library in California. Her research focuses on women modernists, narrative and war trauma, and she has scholarly publications on Edith Wharton, Elizabeth von Arnim, Katherine Mansfield, Sylvia Townsend Warner, Virginia Woolf and Santa Claus.

This is a hugely exciting addition to the world of Elizabeth von Arnim studies, tracing the wealth of research on this important author and providing brilliant new readings of her work. This is a major step forward in von Arnim scholarship, and a valuable contribution – and challenge – to modernist literary history.

• List of IllustrationsAcknowledgementsIntroduction: : The Unexpected ModernistNoreen O’Connor and Jennifer ShepherdPart I. Returning to Elizabeth: Gender, Politics and Genre1. Women Who Take to the Sofa: Rewriting Narratives of Marriage and Motherhood in Elizabeth von Arnim’s The Pastor’s WifeNoreen O’Connor2. Writing Women’s 'Second Half’: Discourses of Ageing in Elizabeth von Arnim’s The Enchanted April, Love and Mr SkeffingtonJennifer Shepherd3. Feminism and Conservatism in Elizabeth von Arnim's Fiction: The Edwardian NovelsKate Macdonald4. ‘This Secret Treasure’: Suppression of Female Identity in An Introduction to SallyCharlotte FiehnPart II. Reimagining Elizabeth: New Critical Directions5. ‘It was the Clothes that Wore Out the Woman’: Fashion, Mobility and New Constructions of Womanhood in the Work of Elizabeth von ArnimStacy Sivinski and Trish Bredar6. The Business of ElizabethAnn Herndon Marshall7. Kinderszenen and the Kindergarten: Elizabeth von Arnim’s The April Baby’s Book of TunesSally Horovitz8. ‘No Eye for Nature and Frozen Seas’: Baltic Landscapes and Female Self-expression in Elizabeth von Arnim’s Early WorksClaire McKeownPart III. Reading Elizabeth, Reading Others9. ‘Neither Art Itself Nor Life Itself’: The New Biographies of Virginia Woolf and Elizabeth von ArnimJuliane Römhild10. ‘If She Must See, To See in Silence’: Catching Up with the Victorians in The Caravaners and The Enchanted AprilCarolyn W. de la L. Oulton11. ‘Women on the Move’: Elizabeth von Arnim, Elizabeth Bowen and the Search for HomeNick TurnerNotes on ContributorsIndex