This fascinating new book offers a detailed account of the prolific debate about the sensation novel and considers the genre's dialogues with a number of sciences. Well-known and obscure sensation novels are read against this context in order to recover the forgotten history of sensual reading the genre inspired.

'...persuasive and enlightening, revealing a good eye for detail and nuance...' - BSLS

Autorentext
LAURIE GARRISON is Lecturer in English at the University of Lincoln, UK. She has published on a number of interdisciplinary topics, such as visual culture in the work of Wilkie Collins and the science of sexuality in Mary Braddon's novels.

Inhalt
Acknowledgements Preface PART I: TAXONOMIES OF STIMULATION: SCIENCE, GENDER AND SEXUALITY IN THE SENSATION NOVEL DEBATE The Invention of the Sensation Novel: Three Early Reviewers The Debate Intensifies: Responses to the Early Reviewers Gender and Sexuality in Parodies of the Sensation Novel Debate PART II: MAGNETIC SCIENCE AND THE SENSATION NOVEL: STIMULATING BODIES, SENSES AND SOULS The Interrelated Histories of Mesmerism, Spiritualism and the Sensation Novel Mesmeric and Erotic Affinities in The Woman in White Bodily Pleasures and Spiritual Unions in Cometh Up as a Flower PART III: SOCIAL SCIENCE AND THE RISE OF SENSATION HEROINE: RECONFIGURING THE FEMALE BREEDING BODY From Economics to Evolution: Sensationalising Courtship, Marriage and Reproduction Great Expectations : Estella's Subtle Sensations Aurora Floyd : A Manifesto for the Sensation Heroine St Martin's Eve : Variations of the Sensation Heroine Conclusion: The Afterlife of the Sensation Novel Bibliography Index