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Beastly Possessions
Animals in Victorian Consumer Culture
Sarah Amato (Author)
9781442648746
Hardback, published 30 October 2015
320 pages, 41 b&w illustrations
24 x 16.4 x 2.7 cm, 0.62 kg
‘This book is a great read and offers much insight to readers who want to know more about the connections between human and animal world.’
In Beastly Possessions, Sarah Amato chronicles the unusual ways in which Victorians of every social class brought animals into their daily lives. Captured, bred, exhibited, collected, and sold, ordinary pets and exotic creatures – as well as their representations – became commodities within Victorian Britain’s flourishing consumer culture. As a pet, an animal could be a companion, a living parlour decoration, and proof of a household’s social and moral status. In the zoo, it could become a public pet, an object of curiosity, a symbol of empire, or even a consumer mascot. Either kind of animal might be painted, photographed, or stuffed as a taxidermic specimen. Using evidence ranging from pet-keeping manuals and scientific treatises to novels, guidebooks, and ephemera, this fascinating, well-illustrated study opens a window into an underexplored aspect of life in Victorian Britain.
Introduction 1. The Social Lives of Pets 2. Sexy Beasts, Fallen Felines, and Pampered Pomeranians 3. In the Zoo: Civilizing Animals and Displaying People 4. The White Elephant in London: On Trickery, Racism, and Advertising 5. Dead Things: The Afterlives of Animals