Convict Voices

“Schwan's nuanced, richly contextualized readings illuminate how a ranged of nineteenth-century texts give voice to the all-too-often inaudible perspectives of female prisoners.” —Megan Sweeney, associate professor of English, University of Michigan

“Schwan offers a 'sustained interrogation—and occasional celebration' of women's voices on the subject of prison. In so doing, she attends to the too-often ignored centrality of those voices in the histories of modern imprisonment and feminism.”—Jason Haslam, associate professor of English, Dalhousie University

“This book is strongest in its analysis of contemporary perceptions of female criminality and of the morally and socially challenging phenomenon of women in prison. Schwan’s selection of cases and events and the range of literature—both factual and fictional—is impressive and the analysis is generally persuasive. I do not know of another work that ranges with such brio from street-sold broadsheets to Victorian and Modern literature and culture.”



—Victorian Studies