ABSTRACT
The love/hate relationship that the Victorians bore to animals is one of the most fascinating paradoxes of the nineteenth century. It was one that permeated the culture. Although most Victorians believed that they had “the beast on the leash,” this collection of articles suggests that this was an unrealistic aspiration, but it was definitely an aspiration. Despite earlier published efforts to do so, to arrive at a normative as to how and why the Victorians treated animals and human animals as they did would be utterly impossible because there was no consistency in ideology, theory, or practice; however, that very inconsistency is a critique. The fallacy of control in itself is very revealing not only toward a more accurate understanding of the Victorians, but also of our modern-day efforts to behave appropriately as members of a global humanity. The introduction to this collection offers an overview of relationships between the Victorians and their animals followed by a history of evolving posthuman theory and synopses of chapters that take a variety of theoretical approaches to their study of the Victorians and their animals.
