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In Satanic Feminism: Lucifer as the Liberator of Woman in Nineteenth-Century Culture, Per Faxneld argues, “Furthering our understanding of this type of Satanism, which functioned at the time as a shorthand for a cluster of standpoints in opposition to Christian conservative social mores in general as well as to patriarchy, enables us to better comprehend key figures and currents in our cultural history. It will also tell us some interesting things about the renegotiation of the signification of beings from religious myth in times of secularization, when traditional institutionalized religiosity was being questioned” (pg. 3). Fexneld draws extensively upon the theoretical work of Michel Foucault, Antonio Gramsci, Julia Kristeva, and Mikhail Bakhtin in his examination of gender and text. Further, he follows the definition of myth and counter-myth developed by religious historian Bruce Lincoln. Faxneld’s work complements and responds to Sandra M. Gilbert and Susan Gubar’s The Madwoman in the Attic: The Woman Writer and the Nineteenth-Century Literary Imagination as well as the work of Nina Auerbach.

Faxneld writes, “Nineteenth-century feminists often felt they somehow had to deal with male chauvinists’ use of the story in Genesis 3. One way of doing so, which seems to have been quite widespread, was to turn the tale on its head, making Eve a heroine and the serpent benevolent” (pg. 72). Turning to Gothic literature, Faxneld writes, “It is notable that popular fiction tended to have a moralizing tone, even when an ambiguous sympathy for the women in league with the Devil is observable… Gothic texts were all the same party to the gradual shift in the view of such females, which made them more and more attractive as in some sense positive role models” (pg. 143-144). In this, he draws upon the work of Robert D. Hume. Faxneld writes of the portrayal of witchcraft in popular culture, “The historical witch… became a tool for criticizing established religious institutions, a denunciation that could also be extended to their patriarchal traits. Authors with feminist sympathies seized on the figure of the witch as their ancestress, an audacious proto-suffragette” (pg. 248). Faxneld concludes, “The texts of Satanic feminism all exhibit disruptive and dissident modes of reading scripture or relating to Christian traditions concerning woman and the Devil” (pg. 513).

Faxneld’s Satanic Feminism will primarily appeal to those studying nineteenth-century literature at the collegiate level or religious studies scholars. For his theory-heavy style, those unfamiliar with Foucault, Gramsci, and others may find themselves lost. Individual chapters would work well as assigned readings in literature, history, or religious studies classes and people with an interest in modern Satanism may find this an interesting history. ( )