Abstract
"This thesis features an original novel, The Butcher of Berner Street, set in London in 1882. The central character, Leo Stanhope, is a transgender man who must keep his secret while investigating a brutal murder. The purpose is to represent a trans* person in a narrative of the Victorian period.
Numerous nineteenth century newspaper obituaries and records of court proceedings provide evidence of real trans* people1. Some became quite famous, such as James Barry, Ernest Boulton and Frederick Park. However, contemporaneous British fiction authors almost entirely omitted trans* characters from their narratives. There were characters who could be seen as relating to the trans* experience, such as androgynous youths and supernatural monsters, but almost none who were explicitly trans*. The omission is noteworthy because there were trans* characters in fiction prior to and after the Victorian period, and trans* characters in some French works of fiction of that period.
The contention of this thesis is that the paucity of trans* characters in British Victorian fiction was the consequence of a cultural hegemony aimed at conserving the social and gender hierarchies, and that this cultural hegemony was, at least in part, a consequence of a fear among the ruling classes that social change would lead to political upheaval. The effects of that cultural hegemony may not be limited to the Victorian period itself. Modern readers may erroneously interpret the paucity of trans* characters in Victorian fiction as meaning that trans* people did not exist at that time. Neo-Victorian novels such as The Butcher of Berner Street, which include members of under-represented groups, offer a re-examination and re-interpretation of our narratives of Victorian society."