Reading the in-between : gender, space and identity in the serialised novels of Ada Cambridge and Tasma

Abstract

Between 1880 and 1890, the serialisation of novels by instalment in local newspapers was the most accessible and popular form of novel publication for writers in Australia. Considering the prevalence of serial publication for Australian women writers, this thesis considers the serial context of four settler romance novels: The Three Miss Kings (1883) and A Woman's Friendship (1888) by Ada Cambridge, and The Pipers of Piper's Hill (1889) and In Her Earliest Youth (1890) by Tasma. All of the selected novels for this thesis were serialised in weekly instalments in the Australasian, with the exception of A Woman's Friendship which was serialised in weekly instalments in the Age. By repositioning these texts in their serial context, this thesis uncovers the dialogistic relationship between the newspaper content that surrounded the serial chapters of Tasma's and Cambridge's novels. Through archival research on Australia's colonial newspapers and magazines as well as close readings of all four novels, this thesis extends literary criticism of these texts beyond an increasingly familiar discussion of nationality to consider the cultural significance and social relevance the serial novels had at the time of their publication. In particular, this thesis examines how networks of women actively construct and deconstruct real and imagined spaces as they move through the metropolis of Melbourne between 1880 and 1890. The multiple heroines' literal and metaphoric 'journeying' in each text-escaping from and later returning to their husbands and homes -thus becomes a main focal point of this investigation. As such, this thesis argues that within these narrative spaces, issues of gender and identity are discourses that reflect and engage with broader socio-political narratives of the period concerned with women's changing role in society and the institution of marriage.

Date of Award	2019
Original language	English