Katherine Cooper and Emma Short (eds) The female figure in contemporary historical fiction

Reviewed by: Emma Young, University of Lincoln, UK

This edited collection, focusing on the female figure in contemporary historical fiction, marks an important critical interjection into the field of women's historical fiction studies and is a welcome addition to a growing body of research. Since the millennium, the publication of historical fiction by women (most notably the parlance of neo-Victorian fiction) has been subject to increasing academic interest from scholars, including Ann Heilmann and Mark Llewellyn (2010), Diana Wallace (2005) and Jeanette King (2005). Readily drawing upon this established scholarship, yet with its own unique perspective, this collection injects fresh life into the conversation about women's historical fiction with a diverse body of essays. Remarking in their introduction that the female figure in history is ‘now palpable, multidimensional, and undeniably present’ (p. 1), the editors simultaneously capture the tone of their own collection and that of the authors and texts the essays discuss. Further, given the UK television adaptations of Kate Mosse's Labyrinth (Channel Four, March 2013), Philippa Gregory's The White Queen (BBC, June–August 2013), and the BBC's recent commission of PD James’ bestselling novel Death Comes to Pemberley, the historical female figure as both desirable and marketable seems a resoundingly timely argument.

From Mills and Boon medieval ‘bodice rippers’ through to the queer romances of Emma Donoghue and from well-known historical figures such as Anne Boleyn to the lesser known Clara Schumann, The Female Figure in Contemporary Historical Fiction offers a heterogeneous snapshot of the genre. Feminist in its impetus, it recuperates a space for ‘serious appraisal’ (p. 17) of women's historical fiction as a popular and academic discourse. Part I, entitled ‘Historical Women: Revisioning Real Lives’, encompasses a selection of essays from Theresa Jamieson's work on Janice Galloway's Clara through to Emma Short's ‘Making up, or making over: Reconstructing the modern female author’. Whilst the former explores how Galloway reclaims Clara from muse and resurrects her as a musical subject, the latter piece discusses literary biography and the biographical novel to broaden the collection's parameters with a critique of genre. Likewise, Kym Brindle's chapter on Margaret Atwood's Alias Grace and Julie Crane's study of ‘The literary fortunes of Anne Boleyn’ complete this first section by dissembling history and authority in the analysis of the diary form and examining the re-invention of Anne Boleyn in popular iconography.

Part II, ‘Imagined Histories: Romancing Fictional Heroines’, commences with Amy Burge discussing the Medieval Collection from Mills and Boon to suggest a subversive potentiality in the medieval motifs along with a simultaneous appropriation and reflection of the time period. This ‘subversive potentiality’ encapsulates this section of the collection as indicated by Nadine Muller's lively discussion of pornography and ‘Sexual f(r)ictions’ in Belinda Starling's The Journal of Dora Damage and Sarah Waters' Fingersmith. Claire O'Callaghan debates ‘Donoghue's excavation of lesbian history through fiction’ (p. 134) with a focus on Anne Damer and this engagement with queer politics builds poignantly on Muller's preceding chapter whilst offering a much needed assessment of Donoghue's historical novel. Closing the section, Katherine Cooper's work on Kate Mosse's Sepulchre not only engages with the politics of the female gothic, but also manages to perpetuate a two-way dialogue which sees her argue for an understanding of third-wave gothic as a substantial field. This highlights an arena in which further academic study is desired.

A more personal and reflective approach begins to emerge in the final section, ‘Rewriting History: Reasserting the Female’ with the inclusion of Diana Wallace, Susan Sellers and Alice Thompson who reflect on their own personal experiences of reading and writing historical fiction; an apt reminder that the political is always personal. Alongside these personal perspectives reside Siân Harris's work on A.S. Byatt and Marina Warner and Anna Gething's discussion of Kate Grenville. An impressive characteristic of this latter chapter is the focus on how the female voice of both author and character can be inserted into a conventionally male genre, that of the colonial narrative of ‘great men’. Indeed, analysis of novels that employ male protagonists emphasises the positively nuanced and progressive feminist impulse of the collection.

As the features of this collection I have discussed here indicate, The Female Figure in Contemporary Historical Fiction is a finely argued and extensively inclusive body of research which embodies a refreshing and innovative intervention into the field of reclaiming, rewriting, revisioning and reviewing the female figure and, notably, the female authors who depict them. The level of research and quality of the prose ensure that the collection will prove to be an invaluable resource for undergraduate students interested in learning more about women's historical fiction through to established academics in all arenas of gender and women's studies.