James Hogg, the Three Perils, and the Pragmatics of Bourgeois Marriage

Citation

Leonardi B (2012) James Hogg, the Three Perils, and the Pragmatics of Bourgeois Marriage. Studies in Hogg and His World, (22), pp. 19-38.

Abstract
First paragraph: Giving voice to controversial figures such as prostitutes, as well as questioning culturally constructed stereotypes of gender, James Hogg challenged the emerging discourse of empire in early-nineteenth-century Britain. This article will hence investigate Hogg's treatment of the trope of marriage - as developed in the national tale for articulating imperial hierarchies in familial terms - in his long narratives The Three Perils of Man (1822) and The Three Perils of Woman (1823). It will argue that by opposing the domestic Madonna and the public prostitute through a strategic use of voices, Hogg negotiated and rearticulated this dynamic in order to expose both the ideology behind bourgeois marriage and the contradictions at the heart of empire formation.

Journal
Studies in Hogg and His World, Issue 22