ABSTRACT
This introductory chapter gives an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. Nineteenth-century marriage was a socially constructed gamble in which the odds were weighted heavily in favour of existing social, cultural and legal power structures. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, divorce petitions were exceedingly rare. The 1836 Act for Marriages in England enabled ministers of churches other than the Church of England to conduct marriages. Custody of Infants Act (1839) enabled women with sufficient means to petition the equity courts for custody of children up to the age of seven and for periodic access to children aged over seven. There is an emerging scholarly interest in literary representations of marriage. Women's discourse during the long struggle for marriage reform was conducted in a variety of forums: formal and informal, public and private. Journalism offered women a public space in which to openly debate their concerns.
