Victorian Conversion Narratives and Reading Communities - 9781409453772

Taylor & Francis

Reading canonical authors such as John Henry Newman, Charles Dickens, Charlotte Bront\u00C3\u00AB, George Eliot and Oscar Wilde through a dual lens of literary history and post-liberal theology, Emily Walker Heady suggests that Victorian authors discuss conversion experiences in the context of the modes in which they are narrated. Thus, conversion narratives became a form of literary criticism, while literary conventions functioned as a means of discussing the nature of conversion. > Because Victorian authors rarely discuss conversion experiences separately from the modes in which they are narrated, Emily Walker Heady argues that the conversion narrative became, in effect, a form of literary criticism. Literary conventions, in turn, served the reciprocal function as a means of discussing the nature of what Heady calls the 'heart-change.' Heady reads canonical authors such as John Henry Newman, Charles Dickens, Charlotte Bront\u00C3\u00AB, George Eliot, and Oscar Wilde through a du.