{"id":497,"date":"2012-09-18T19:24:05","date_gmt":"2012-09-18T17:24:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/?p=497"},"modified":"2012-09-18T19:24:05","modified_gmt":"2012-09-18T17:24:05","slug":"olivers-bastardy-beyond-the-workhouse-and-into-the-law","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/2012\/09\/18\/olivers-bastardy-beyond-the-workhouse-and-into-the-law\/","title":{"rendered":"OLIVER\u2019S BASTARDY: BEYOND THE WORKHOUSE AND INTO THE LAW <\/strong>"},"content":{"rendered":"

Typically, there comes a point when after reading a particular book six or seven times, a new angle opens up and I wonder how come I\u2019d missed that. In the case of Dickens\u2019s Oliver Twist<\/em> perhaps this has much to do with having overlooked the details of the rocambolesque explanation of the connection between the poor orphan Oliver and his wicked stepbrother, Edward Leeford a.k.a. \u2018Monks.\u2019<\/p>\n

As Mr Brownlow explains (SPOILERS AHEAD…), Leeford Sr. was married off by his greedy family at the tender age of 21 to what was indeed in Regency times an old maid: a 30-year-old rich heiress. The offspring of the ill-fated marriage was Edward, apparently born wicked because of his parents\u2019 unhappiness. Edwin Leeford not only separated from his wife, but also disowned this elder son for his bad behaviour, at least nominally, not quite legally. The said Edwin then seduced pretty teen Agnes, befuddled her with the excuse that a big secret prevented him from marrying her, and made her pregnant with Oliver, never disclosing that he was already married. Then he fled to Rome, corroded by guilt, to elaborate a plan to, presumably, become a bigamist. Instead, he died and his evil first wife took the chance to destroy a second will in which he acknowledged the existence of Agnes and her bastard (not yet born). This revengeful harridan also told Agnes\u2019s father what a bad girl his daughter was, which brought about her disgrace and her untimely death in childbirth at Mudfog\u2019s workhouse. Monks, learning that the bastard had survived, concocted a strange plan with his buddy Fagin to turn him into a criminal and, if possible, do away with him. Strange, very strange.<\/p>\n

The fact that Oliver is illegitimate is hardly concealed in the novel. He gives Noah Claypole a serious beating up for suggesting that Agnes was less than pure and it\u2019s all through quite clear that Oliver can\u2019t name his father. What I had missed is Mr Brownlow\u2019s cornering of Monks until this very poor example of an elder brother accepts sharing what little is left of Edwin\u2019s legacy with Oliver (6,000 pounds). I can\u2019t check Susan Zlotnick\u2019s article \u201c’The Law’s a Bachelor’: Oliver Twist<\/em>, Bastardy, and the New Poor Law\u201d (Victorian Literature and Culture<\/em>, 34:1, 2006), nor Laura Schattschneider\u2019s \u201cMr Brownlow’s Interest in Oliver Twist\u201d (Journal of Victorian Culture<\/em>, 6.1, 2001) because that would cost me 60 euros \u2013too much to prepare my seminar for tomorrow and satisfy my curiosity. The free access article by Dorothy L. Haller, \u201cBastardy and Baby Farming in Victorian England\u201d (http:\/\/www.loyno.edu\/~history\/journal\/1989-0\/haller.htm<\/a>), however, informs me that although previous to 1834 fathers of illegitimate children had to support them, fear that single women would commit perjury against \u2018innocent\u2019 men, led to the Bastardy Clause in the New Poor Law of that year. By this, \u201cAll illegitimate children (…) were to be the sole responsibility of their mothers until they were 16 years old.\u201d If Agnes had survived, being unable to support her child, she would anyway have ended up in the workhouse with him. This blatant injustice was overturned in 1844 (see also for free, http:\/\/www.workhouses.org.uk\/poorlaws<\/a>\/newpoorlaw.shtml#Bastardy)<\/p>\n

Yet, this is not quite my point. The fact is that through Brownlow (who, remember, adopts Oliver once he\u2019s proven to be a good boy), Dickens defends the right of illegitimate children to be granted equal rights as regards their father\u2019s inheritance. A peculiar website on genealogy (http:\/\/www.british-genealogy.com\/forums\/showthread.php\/72235-Illegitimacy-and-inheritance<\/a>) explains that in 19th century England (not Scotland) \u201ca child who was born illegitimate had no inheritance rights\u201d unless a) the parents married after its birth (without committing bigamy, of course), b) or the illegitimate child would be \u201cprovided for in a legal settlement\u201d or \u201cbequeathed a legacy in a legally valid will.\u201d The latter was indeed the case with Oliver, though as Edward\u2019s mother destroys his father\u2019s second will, Monks can very well keep the whole inheritance for himself, as I understand. Only Brownlow\u2019s bullying and the threat of being reported as Fagin\u2019s accomplice in Oliver\u2019s abuse does the trick.<\/p>\n

This defence of the bastard \u2013together with that of Agnes as a fallen woman, and of Rose as the collateral damage of that fall\u2013 is, now that I think about it, as sensational as Anne Bront\u00eb\u2019s defence of Helen as a runaway wife in The Tenant of Wildfell Hall<\/em>. I might be totally mistaken in thinking this is not a central issue in Oliver Twist<\/em>-related bibliography but I certainly had missed it. My apologies to my previous students… it just scares me to think that what other elephant in the room I\u2019m missing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Typically, there comes a point when after reading a particular book six or seven times, a new angle opens up and I wonder how come I\u2019d missed that. In the case of Dickens\u2019s Oliver Twist perhaps this has much to do with having overlooked the details of the rocambolesque explanation of the connection between the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":98,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[45],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-497","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-oliver-twist"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/497","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/98"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=497"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/497\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=497"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=497"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webs.uab.cat\/saramartinalegre\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=497"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}