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Bodies of Stories: Disability and Folklore in Nineteenth-Century British Literature

Cleto, Sara Baer, Cleto

Abstract Details

2018, Doctor of Philosophy, Ohio State University, English.
In this dissertation, I trace the ways in which folk narratives, when embedded in fiction, facilitate discourses of disability. I argue that folk narratives are called upon in nineteenth-century British literature not only to express anxieties concerning the unruly body and mind but also to create space in which stories and experiences that are otherwise untellable might be told. This fundamentally interdisciplinary project draws upon folkloric and literary scholarship and reframes them through the lens of disability studies. The chapters that follow address influential texts penned during the long nineteenth century. In Chapter One, I examine Wordsworth’s use of the ballad, contextualizing Lyrical Ballads (1798) within the emergent concept of folklore and illuminating how the language and belief patterns of British folklore can underpin complex depictions of disabled experiences. Chapter Two addresses Emily Bronte¨’s novel Wuthering Heights (1847) and the folk narrative genre of the legend, arguing that the novel’s notorious ambiguity and fragmentation are narrative strategies that accommodate unstable, disruptive concepts such as disability and the supernatural. Chapter Three explores the fairy tale through George MacDonald’s “The History of Photogen and Nycteris: A Day and Night Marchen” (1882), analyzing it as a retelling of Beaumont’s “Beauty and the Beast” and considering the tale’s villain as a collision between the fairy tale witch and the “mad” scientist. Chapter Four addresses the folk narrative genre of myth and its redeployment in Arthur Machen’s novella The Great God Pan (1890), which vocalizes fears concerning disabled bodies that resist containment, treatment, or explanation despite advances in science and medicine.
Clare Simmons (Advisor)
Ray Cashman (Advisor)
Amy Shuman (Committee Member)
Jill Galvan (Committee Member)
228 p.

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Cleto, Cleto, S. B. (2018). Bodies of Stories: Disability and Folklore in Nineteenth-Century British Literature [Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1534683947720131

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Cleto, Cleto, Sara. Bodies of Stories: Disability and Folklore in Nineteenth-Century British Literature. 2018. Ohio State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1534683947720131.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Cleto, Cleto, Sara. "Bodies of Stories: Disability and Folklore in Nineteenth-Century British Literature." Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University, 2018. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1534683947720131

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)