Brute compassion: The ambivalent growth of sympathy for animals in English literature and culture, 1671--1831.

摘要

This dissertation explores the marked growth of sympathy for animals in the long eighteenth century, with particular focus on the hesitation and conflict surrounding considerations of animal welfare in poetry, novels, periodicals, and Parliamentary debates. Though compassion for animals was a popular topic in eighteenth-century publishing, and middle-class citizens were noticing and becoming uncomfortable with institutional and recreational cruelties towards animals, social reform did not necessarily manifest in direct and obvious ways. The trajectory of sympathy has never been sure; advances in one area seem to be counterbalanced by sacrifices on other sides.; Chapter one explores hunting as an already ambivalent site that becomes a battleground between England's ascending, theriophilic middle-class and its landed gentry. Compassion for animals becomes a platform which both sides deploy successfully; by the time England's first anti-cruelty legislation is passed, the sport of hunting is more accessible than ever before, and the sum total of actual benefit to hunted or persecuted animals is minimal. Works by Sir John Denham, William Somerville, Alexander Pope, Oliver Goldsmith, James Thomson, William Cowper, William Windham, Lord Erskine, and Richard Martin are considered.; Chapter two argues that the sensibility movement proves ambivalent on the subject of animals, often sacrificing animals for the furthered interests of human actors. Works studied are Laurence Sterne's A Sentimental Journey, Henry Mackenzie's The Man of Feeling, Samuel Richardson's Pamela, Eliza Haywood's The History of Miss Betsy Thoughtless, Frances Burney's Evelina , Sarah Scott's A Description of Millenium Hall, and Mary Wollstonecraft's Maria: Or, the Wrongs of Woman.; Chapter three explores ambivalence in the sub-genre of circulation novels. Within these theriophilic, didactic works written primarily for children, traditional exploitations of both animals and subordinate people jar against moments of progressive sympathy for animals.; The fourth and final chapter focuses on Samuel Johnson's writings about and personal encounters with animals. Examining his public contributions to discourse about animals beside his private life as a fond pet-keeper and avid naturalist creates a multi-layered picture of the ambivalence felt by the middle-class as individuals and as a collective who were compassionate, socially ambitious, and eager to reform English society.