The Secret life of things: animals, objects, and it-narratives in eighteenth-century England

Abstract

Mark Blackwell (ed.). The secret Life of Things: Animals, Objects, and ItNarratives in Eighteenth-Century England. Lewisburg: Bucknell UP, 2007. $62.50 365 pp ISBN 10:0-8387-5666-2 I am sure that Jane Austen purists world over are steaming, a former student wrote to me. She was referring to Becoming Jane - latest film release on Jane Austen. Austen phenomena, similar to it-narratives of eighteenth century, has taken on a life of its own. Very little in film had to do with Austen's actual letters and biographical data. Most of plot seemed based on a loose interpretation of her books, with Austen as Elizabeth Bennett and Tom Le Froy as a more cavalier Fitzwilliam D'Arcy Pride and Prejudice; yet, people flocked to movie theater nonetheless, anxious to be entertained and romanced. Austen has become an icon of public sphere - known and even by many. Some argue that what people have come to think of Austen has become more influential than who she actually was. Though Mark BlackwelPs edited collection of essays covers a panoply of topics, one thread that seems to run through a number of them is idea that itnarratives of eighteenth century - stories told by coins, coats, dogs, goose quills, watches, slippers, shoes, pincushions, and host of other objects and animals - somehow take on a life of their own. In this way, they parallel eighteenth century texts themselves, which pass from author to printer to reader and in process, essentially go through a type of transformation. The reader, in purchasing book monetarily, owns it - even somehow possessing lives of characters beyond pages of book. In The Golden Spy, for instance, its author Gildon realizes easily his words spiral out of control once introduced into public sphere; before story even begins, book has assumed an autonomous role as an object of (164). Many of objects and animals in it-narratives tell of how they are passed place to place - having different owners, adventures, and even identities. One person may treat a as an object of trade - another, as a keepsake. In Helenus Scott's Adventures of a Rupee 1782, when rupee is dislocated its origins in India, it ceases to be a 'current coin and essentially becomes something different. Its value is not intrinsic; rather, it is based exclusively on caprice of (78). So it is with very books that house it-narratives. Books circulating in public sphere became property of owner to be interpreted, molded, and even re-invented - perhaps many times over by many owners. The implications of this phenomenon were vast, including what Deidre Lynch calls democratization of consumption where the boundaries of wealth and class appeared increasingly permeable, as luxuries that were once confined to an elite few came to seem as if they might potentially be every person's property. went being individualized keepsakes to becoming mass produced commodities - much like books (85). This socio-political undercurrent connected to it-narratives is pervasive throughout The secret Life of Things - and irony in this title is that what was once private or privileged information among elite came to be less esoteric or distinct - a secret no more. It-narratives, with their universal appeal, straightforward language, and fantastical adventures became popular among emerging middle class. Even if, as Nicholas Hudson argues, it-narratives thinly veiled author's moral and political directives through voices of lapdogs, guineas, overcoats, corkscrews, hackney coaches, [and] banknotes (294), intended meanings were changed, lost, or simply disregarded as greater numbers of readers owned their texts. …

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