Journal article
"A good hater”: Writing about the Emotions with George Eliot and A. S. Byatt
S Trigg
Emotions: History, Culture, Society | Brill on behalf of Society for the History of Emotions | Published : 2017
Abstract
This essay takes as its starting point a reflection of a character in A.S. Byatt’s Still Life: ‘George Eliot, Stephanie thought, was a good hater.’ This comment refers to Eliot’s satirical analysis of middle-class sensibilities and emotional affectations in The Mill on the Floss. This essay explores the emotional resonances of this phrase that links these two very different novels, written in different centuries and structured around very different thematic concerns. Nevertheless, this connection between them, and the way a small modern community of readers responded to this connection on social media helps us theorise the distinctive contribution literary studies can make to the history of ..
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