Fictions of Female Adultery 1684-1890: Theories and Circumtexts

This work is a study of the theory of the novel of adultery, and of the representation of adultery in earlier British and later 19th-century French fiction. Women's adultery provides many of the plots that run through 19th-century European fiction. This book discusses how novels of adultery have been theorized, argues its own theoretical perspective, and analyses two "circumtexts" of the fiction of female adultery: its pre-history in 18th- century Britain, and its decline during the Naturalist period in France.