隨著家庭逐漸成為社會經濟與情感道德的基本單位，有關天生或養育的辯論激化了母親哺乳運動，啟蒙論述重要的一環—教育—更加集中焦點在女性的胸部。此論文企圖釐清在愛爾蘭作家愛芝渥斯兩部小說《憂鬱》與《柏玲達》中哺育造成小孩與母親的複雜情結。這兩部小說均勾勒出主角如何認清並接受自身角色的曲折過程。兩部小說均創作於法國大革命之後，愛芝渥斯承認中產階級的工作倫理與母親的社會職責，確是國家健康與穩定的雙重支柱。但女性哺育的主題允許愛芝渥斯從內部挑戰啟蒙論述。透過此主題，愛芝渥斯與女性主義的先驅渥斯東克麗芙特展開對話，愛芝渥斯在《憂鬱》中將理性與其逆反成分相互揉雜，並在《柏玲達》中呈現母性的表演本質。這兩部小說似乎製造出「嬰兒處方奶」，幫助愛芝渥斯探究書中角色在文化、社會、與私我層面的改革過程中如何調適自我。

The Enlightenment discourse of education centers on the bosom of woman as the family gradually becomes a basic sentimental and moral unit of the society and the debate between nature and nurture fuels the campaign of maternal suckling. This paper aims to gauge the implications of breast-feeding as they are presented in Maria Edgeworth’s novels, on the child and the nation in Ennui and on the mother in Belinda. These two novels are chosen for investigation for four-fold connections: protagonist in disguise, issues related to breast-feeding, medical case study and self-reflexivity. The two novels chart the protagonists’ journey toward reconciliation with their true selves: the Anglo-Irish Lord Glenthorn, after recognizing the Irish nurse as his real mother, relinquishes and regains his title and estate in Ennui; Lady Delacour recovers from her breast wound while coming to terms with her true mission as the heart of the sentimental network in Belinda. Written in the wake of the French Revolution, these two novels acknowledge the bourgeois ethics of work and
motherhood as twin pillars of national health and security. The focus on
breast-feeding allows Edgeworth to challenge the Enlightenment discourse from within. In Ennui, Edgeworth neutralizes the contamination of milk/speech/blood by revealing the wet nurse as the mother. The conflation of nurse and mother prepares her blueprint of the modern Ireland, in which the purely bred Irish gentry incorporates English professionalism. On the other hand, in Belinda, she allows Lady Delacour
to retain her subjectivity from complete compromise or “dilution” though ensconced within domestic ideology. This paper seeks to show how Maria Edgeworth negotiates her attitudes toward women’s obligations in a dialogue with Mary Wollstonecraft by refracting the rational dictum via blending contradictory proponents in Ennui and by foregrounding self-conscious performativity in Belinda. It is this magic “formula” (a term borrowed from modern industry of infant diet) that enables her xploration into the characters whose reformation centers on the bosom of women.