What would you do if you had no rights to your own money or children, but your abusive husband did? How would you survive if you couldn’t inherit the family estate because you were female? What if your only path to engaging in a social and political life were through an arranged marriage? 

British novelists Fanny Burney, Jane Austen, Anne Bronte, and Elisabeth Gaskell addressed these questions and other serious cultural, political, and intellectual issues of their times—from the evolving status of women to the growth of the British empire, from the shifting views on literature’s purpose to the social unrest created by industrialization.

Join Lisbeth Strimple Fuisz, a lecturer at Georgetown University, in spirited commentary and informal discussions about the works of these authors as they navigate the hierarchical world of England in the 18th and 19th centuries.

Participants should read the featured book ahead of the session.

FEATURED BOOK

Fanny Burney’s Evelina; or, A Young Lady’s Entrance into the World (1778)

This satirical portrait of British society chronicles the social mishaps and successes of its eponymous heroine, as she struggles to be acknowledged by her father as his rightful heir.

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