Graduation Year
2010
Document Type
Thesis
Degree
M.A.
Degree Granting Department
English
Major Professor
Laura Runge, Ph.D.
Committee Member
Regina Hewitt, Ph.D.
Committee Member
Cynthia Richards, Ph.D.
Keywords
wit, patriarchy, marriage contract, women's language, female agency
Abstract
In the hands of two prominent authors, Elizabeth Inchbald and Frances Burney, a critical paradox concerning female silence arises: while both authors operate very successfully in the publishing world, both do so while subverting impositions of silence, exhibiting a clear breach of propriety. An examination of Inchbald's novel A Simple Story and play Wives as they Were, Maids as they Are and Burney's novel Cecilia and play The Witlings, elucidates how each author adapts literary genres to portray female wit, exposing eighteenth-century impositions of silence in the process. By engendering female characters with the ability to employ humor as young women, Burney and Inchbald develop characters with agency and articulation.
Scholar Commons Citation
Weber, Megan M., "Refusing To Go Silently: Female Wit As Combating A Culture Of Silence In Frances Burney And Elizabeth Inchbald's Texts" (2010). USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations.
https://digitalcommons.usf.edu/etd/1805
