First published in 1978, this multi-disciplinary study embraces a wide selection of topics ranging from family intimacy and authoritarianism to the family as a unit for launching social reforms. Subjects treated in the nine essays include the Victorian attitude to childbirth, the role of the nanny, the power of the upper-class "paterfamilias," the pattern of family work and fertility, and incest among the Victorian working classes. The book is introduced by a critical survey of the state of family history and the need for new studies.

From the essays, the Victorian family emerges as...