Defining Masculinity in A Simple Story

Defining Masculinity in A Simple Story Caroline Breashears When A SimpleStory appeared in 1791, reviewers had no trouble identifying its moral—that women should be given "APROPER EDUCATION"—or its key interest, the priestwho inherits an earldom.' The CriticalReview names Lord Elmwood as the "one hero," while die Analytical Review notes that the reader is never "at a loss to say which is the hero of the tale."2 That hero clearly intrigued them: "Her character, the Roman Catholic lord, is perfecdy new; and she has conducted him, dirough a series of surprising and well-contrasted adventures, with a uniformity of character and truth of description that have rarelybeen surpassed," the Gentleman'sMagazineenthuses.3 The Monthly Review likewise focused on Elmwood in its summary: "To give a picture ofLord Elmwood, in all these trying circumstances, as 1 Elizabeth Inchbald, A SimpleSlory (1791; reprint, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991), p. 338. References are to this edition. During its long gestation, this article benefited from the thoughtful comments of several colleagues. I would particularly like to thankJohn O'Brien, Terry Belanger, Cynthia Wall, Patricia Meyer Spacks, and Sarah Gates for their advice and support. 2 Anon., review ofA SimpleSlory, Critical Review2nd ser., 1 (1791), 207; Mary Wollstonecraft, review of A Simple Story, Analytical Review (May 1791), in Tlte Works, ed. Janet Todd and Marilyn Buder, vol. 7 (NewYork: NewYork University Press, 1989), 370. 3 Anon., review ofA SimpleSlory, Gentleman's Magazine &3 (1791), 255. EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY FICTION, Volume 16, Number 3, April 2004 452 EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY FICTION well in his conduct to his wife, who had dishonoured him, as to die daughter, who was his issue by that wife, is the main design of Mrs. Inchbald's Simple Story."4 These views ofLord Elmwood's character and centrality are rarely echoed today. Most modern readers have found him of secondary interest to Miss Milner and Matilda, whose transgressions and power struggles with Lord Elmwood have been intricately debated.5 Lord Elmwood fares poorly in these discussions, where he is often arraigned as the embodiment of patriarchal injustice.6 A notable exception is Brian McCrea's thoughtful reading ofDorriforth as "the victim of the requirements ofpatrilinear succession," a reading that returns the focus to the hero.7 For most recent readers, however, Lord Elmwood lacks the consistency and compelling interest—even sexiness—that contemporaries found. Certainly few have exclaimed, with Maria Edgeworth, "I am glad I have never metwidi a Dorriforth, for I must inevitably have fallen desperately in love with him."8 Yet to understand die response ofElizabedi Inchbald's first readers mightbe to understand somediing about diis novel and its culture. What made Lord Elmwood not only acceptable but intriguing? What cultural and aesthetic norms or issues might he have evoked in die 1790s? One answer is suggested by recent studies ofmasculinity, a concept in transition in Georgian England. As GJ. Barker-Benfield, Tim Fulford, and others have shown, many eighteenth-century writers were attempting to negotiate a masculine ideal that steered between 4 Anon., review of? SimpleSlory, Monthly Review ìnd ser., 4 (January-April 1791), 436. 5 This debate is evident in the works of, for example, Terry Castle, Masqueradeand Civilization: Tlte Camivalesque in Eighteenth-Century English Culture and Fiction (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1986), Patricia MeyerSpacks, Desireand Truth: Functions ofPlot in EigliteenthCenturyEnglish Novels (Chicago: University ofChicago Press, 1990), and EleanorTy, Unsex'd Revolutionaries:Five Women Novelists oftlte 1790s (Toronto: University ofToronto Press, 1993). 6 See, for example, George E. Haggerty, "Female Abjection in Inchbald's A SimpleStory," SEL 36 (1996), 655-71; Ben P. Robertson, "The Male Self Redefined: Education and the Feminized Man in the Marquis de Sade'sJustine and Elizabeth Inchbald's A Simple Story," University of Tulsa Graduate Review [online journal], 3 (2001). Available from www.utulsa.edu/tugr/Sadelnchbald.htm; INTERNET (accessed 29January 2004). 7 Brian McCrea, Impotent Fathers: PatriarchyandDemographic Crisis in tlteEigliteentli-CenturyNovel (Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1998), p. 171. McCrea's argument illuminates Elmwood's difficulties in relation to personal notions ofhonour and "demographic crisis." McCrea's focus on patriarchy, however, precludes him from situating Elmwood within the culture ofsensibility and the larger debate about masculinity that I consider. 8 Maria Edgeworth, letter...

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