University Press Copublishing Division / Bucknell University Press
Pages: 208
Trim: 6 x 9
978-1-61148-860-9 • Hardback • November 2017 • $95.00 • (£73.00)
978-1-61148-864-7 • eBook • November 2017 • $90.00 • (£69.00)
Kristina Booker is assistant professor of humanities at St. Gregory’s University.
Acknowledgments
Introduction: Becoming Nothing: Writing the Domestic Servant
Chapter 1: Literary Servants and the Trouble with Self-Interest, Part 1
Chapter 2: Literary Servants and the Trouble with Self-Interest, Part 2
Chapter 3: “Within Proper Bounds”: Domestic Servants and Emulation Anxiety
Chapter 4: Domestic Idylls, Exotic Fruits: the Luxury of Foreign Servants
Coda: Downstairs at Downton Abbey
Bibliography
Index
About the Author
Booker condenses a wealth of knowledge into one slim volume, and the ambitious scope of the broad timespan announced in the title is fulfilled, resulting in a well-informed snapshot of textual representations two-hundred-year period. It is rare to find in a single book material that is useful for scholars of both the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. I came away from this text wanting to interrogate the ulterior motivations for the depiction of every servant in fiction (and drama), and this is something to be thankful for.
— Eighteenth-Century Fiction
As a new entry into this undertreated line of critical inquiry, Booker’s 2018 monograph represents a generative step forward. Well researched, accessible, and keenly incisive, Booker interweaves cultural critique and literary interpretation in an expressly cogent and provocative read. . . . I find Menials a truly valuable and original contribution to the field. Kristina Booker is a fine writer and scholar, and her book should spark fresh conversations, both in print and in the classroom, to the profit of specialists and students alike.
— Eighteenth Century Intelligencer