The Social Life of Criticism: Gender, Critical Writing, and the Politics of Belonging by Kimberly J. Stern

Reviewed by: The Social Life of Criticism: Gender, Critical Writing, and the Politics of Belonging by Kimberly J. Stern Miranda Marraccini (bio) Kimberly J. Stern, The Social Life of Criticism: Gender, Critical Writing, and the Politics of Belonging ( Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2016), pp. viii+240, $70 cloth/ $54.95 ebook. In The Social Life of Criticism, Kimberly Stern reimagines the position of the female critic in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. While previous scholarship has portrayed female critics as either integral to or excluded from the profession, Stern maintains that the truth is somewhere in between. This claim is a risky one since she is arguing against extremes. Instead of hedging, however, Stern smartly transforms her argument about liminality into a trans-historical examination of diversity and exclusion in the world of periodical criticism. She writes that "struggle, ambivalence, and discursive strain" have always characterized the relationship between criticism and gender and continue to do so: "We need not choose between a version of literary history that treats women writers as subordinates and one that regards them as equal partners. Instead, we might adopt a historical perspective that recognizes transformations in the intellectual world as a constant negotiation" (54–55). In this way, Stern not only recasts the critical work of the past but also charts a way forward for feminist criticism in the face of persistent scholarly divides and increased political pressure. [End Page 202] Stern uses case studies to demonstrate that the history of female critics is a story of discursive tension. Her chapters proceed chronologically. In the first chapter, which is also her introduction, she lays out her contention that "nineteenth-century female critical consciousness depended implicitly upon a social and at times even sociological understanding of the profession" (3). By "sociological," she means that women had to understand homosocial male periodical culture in order to negotiate their place within and alongside existing critical networks. Stern argues for the need to consider networks "not merely as a reality but as an idea" (8). This idea would benefit from further definition. Although Stern cites canonical texts of network theory and provides modern examples of digital networking projects in a footnote, throughout the book she uses the terms "network," "collectivity," and "community" seemingly interchangeably. In her methodological introduction, Stern treats the periodical as context rather than as genre, addressing it as a textual site of criticism and community-building. She interweaves periodical and non-periodical sources in an attempt to assess criticism as an "evolving and somewhat capacious discursive category" in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries (17). In her second chapter, Stern turns more fully to periodicals, investigating the ways in which they offered a model of public engagement that was less exclusive than the eighteenth-century coffee-house. Writing for periodicals, women worked within existing male collectivities to build their roles as professional critics. Stern's primary texts for this claim are the Female Tatler and the Female Spectator, each written from the perspective of a fictionalized female editor. Stern avoids addressing the idea of adopted personas, both here and in her discussion of George Eliot (121). Recent books in periodical studies, including Alexis Easley's First-Person Anonymous and Linda Peterson's Becoming a Woman of Letters, more thoroughly treat the idea of pseudonymity for female authors. Many of Stern's case studies offer bold new analyses of authors familiar to periodicals scholars, usually with the aim of complicating longstanding critical perceptions. Readers of VPR will appreciate the fresh perspective and sustained attention to often-marginalized figures. Chapter three recasts Anna Jameson as a critical catalyst who helped establish the value of dissent, especially among female critics (58). Jameson rejected gendered critical scripts in favor of heterosocial freedom. Again, this chapter moves fluidly between periodicals and books in an effort to draw on a wider swath of Jameson's writing. It also makes use of illustrations from Fraser's Magazine to bolster its characterization of gendered critical sociability (64, 66). Throughout the book, Stern judiciously chooses satirical cartoons and other periodical images to illustrate both misogyny and the idealization of women. [End Page 203] In her penultimate chapter, Stern focuses on George Eliot, who...

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