Cirrus@Austlit

'Felicity Coombs' essay [...] reads the narrative framing of Ada through a relationship formed by feminine and colonial representations imbued in the physical body of her piano. Here, the distinct prominence of the piano uncoversthe social positioning not only of women in the nineteenth century, but also its social role: how the piano functions in the context of this film "as a vehicle for the symbolic representation of the close link between women and the Victorian domestic culture". The essay also points to the sonoric connection of their bodies teasing out an aural world of interaction between Ada, the piano, and Baines.' (p.xii)