Beyond common sense : ideal love in three novels of Lily Dougall

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dc.contributor.authorSwanson, Scott Rothwellen_US
dc.date.accessioned2024-08-15T18:27:15Z
dc.date.available2024-08-15T18:27:15Z
dc.date.copyright1993en_US
dc.date.issued1993
dc.degree.departmentDepartment of English
dc.degree.levelMaster of Arts M.A.en
dc.description.abstractLily Dougall has received next to no critical attention in contemporary scholarship, probably as a result of her gender and place in a here-to largely neglected nineteenth-century Canadian literature. This thesis contextualizes Dougall's work historically and intellectually in chapter one, and examines three of her novels in order to highlight the theme of ideal love and its relationship to faith. Chapter one argues that popular religious sentiments of the day, evinced by the Social Gospel movement, gave Dougall a forum for her message of religious reform, and clarifies Dougall's philosophy and theology through an examination of her central non-fiction work, Pro Christo et Ecclesia (1900). The belief that women could be guardians of morality provided the means for her literary endeavours. Chapter one explores some of the feminine and feminist aspects of her work as writer. Chapter two discusses the core concepts of ideal love and faith in Dougall's fifth novel, A Question of Faith (1895), and her familiar pitting of "common sense" characters against those exhibiting these ideal characteristics. It demonstrates that Dougall generally depicts female rather than male characters as agents of reform, and as predisposed to intimate friendships, an important concept in Dougall's model. Chapter three examines Dougall's fourth novel, The Mermaid (1895), chronicling the progression of the protagonist from a less to a more idealistic frame of mind, thereby symbolizing the journey Dougall would like to see the whole church make. Marriage is presented as a model for the ideal love Dougall believes Cod wants from humanity. Chapter four considers Dougall's ninth novel, The Earthly Purgatory (1905). As it was in A Question of Faith, the love between family members is portrayed as another of the most perfect forms of love. Reason and "common sense" are examined as masculine attributes, and consequently antithetical to the female sensibility engendering the Christ life.en
dc.format.extent91 pages
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/1828/19841
dc.rightsAvailable to the World Wide Weben_US
dc.subjectUN SDG 5: Gender Equalityen
dc.titleBeyond common sense : ideal love in three novels of Lily Dougallen_US
dc.typeThesisen_US

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