Pets and Domesticity in Victorian Literature and Culture

This book examines how the domestic pet delineates relations for members of the "natural" family home in Victorian literature, exploring the pet in relation to heads of the house, children, and common "outcasts:" orphan, spinster, bachelor, and same-sex couple. Drawing on animal studies and queer theory, it shows how the pet elucidates normative sexuality and (re)productivity within the home, and operates to identify aberrant, failed, or perverse familial and gender performances. This book highlights a familial elsewhere outside of normative models of heterosexuality, reproduction, and the natural family, contributing to Victorian literature and culture, animal studies, and queer studies.