Degeneration and Gender in Victorian Disability
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Dinah Craik’s A Noble Life (1866), Wilkie Collins’ The Law and the Lady (1875), and Lucas Malet’s The History of Sir Richard Calmady: A Romance (1901) present severely disabled characters. These three lesser-known texts not only place disabled men at the center of their narratives but also surreptitiously implant female characters with masculine or homosexual features, which would have denoted degeneration and homosexual panic to Victorian readers. The trope of disability reflects Victorian science theories and the increase in women’s power, which accompanied the New Woman movement and subsequent questioning of gender norms. In this historical context, bodies of the disabled and women became objects to stare at, police, or even alter to validate British masculine superiority. A Noble Life and The History of Sir Richard Calmady suggest a life with disability can be an alternative way and can engender another relationship between a man and woman. Although the female and male authors’ approaches are different, their shared plotline of waning of aristocracy, insulating transmission of disability, and juxtaposing masculine or homosexual women with the disabled suggest blurring the boundary of physical and sexual normalcy beyond the dichotomy between “ability” and “disability.” Reflecting on the contending issues and social atmospheres, A Noble Life, The Law and the Lady, and The History of Sir Richard Calmady demand that their readers contemplate and pursue the diversity of human existence, without stigmatizing or ostracizing the disabled, and compulsorily eliminate standard notions of masculinity or femininity.
Abstract
Dinah Craik’s A Noble Life (1866), Wilkie Collins’ The Law and the Lady (1875), and Lucas Malet’s The History of Sir Richard Calmady: A Romance (1901) present severely disabled characters. These three lesser-known texts not only place disabled men at the center of their narratives but also surreptitiously implant female characters with masculine or homosexual features, which would have denoted degeneration and homosexual panic to Victorian readers. The trope of disability reflects Victorian science theories and the increase in women’s power, which accompanied the New Woman movement and subsequent questioning of gender norms. In this historical context, bodies of the disabled and women became objects to stare at, police, or even alter to validate British masculine superiority. A Noble Life and The History of Sir Richard Calmady suggest a life with disability can be an alternative way and can engender another relationship between a man and woman. Although the female and male authors’ approaches are different, their shared plotline of waning of aristocracy, insulating transmission of disability, and juxtaposing masculine or homosexual women with the disabled suggest blurring the boundary of physical and sexual normalcy beyond the dichotomy between “ability” and “disability.” Reflecting on the contending issues and social atmospheres, A Noble Life, The Law and the Lady, and The History of Sir Richard Calmady demand that their readers contemplate and pursue the diversity of human existence, without stigmatizing or ostracizing the disabled, and compulsorily eliminate standard notions of masculinity or femininity.
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