Meaning of bodice ripper | Babel Free

Definitions

A romantic novel, usually in a historical setting, with frank depictions of sexual activity, especially one in which the female protagonist is seduced; (by extension) a film, television programme, etc., featuring such activity.

informal

Equivalents

Examples

“My aunt would bring a stack of torrid bodice rippers with her to the beach, and would unfailingly blush if disturbed in her reading.”

“Publishers call them hot historicals as opposed to either the virginal variety Barbara Cartland writes or to the bodice rippers "because that's usually what happens to the heroines," Price explained.”

“The name "bodice ripper" was derived from the frequent rapes and sexual assaults that the heroines experienced. "Bodice-ripper" heroines were portrayed to be stronger and more active characters than gothic heroines. Editors of category romances, noting the popularity of the "bodice rippers," have borrowed the longer lengths, the overt sexuality and the assertive heroine from these romances.”

“Soon bodice-rippers, the gothics, the "romance" novel advanced from paperback to hardback, from supermarket racks to book club selections.”

“This book is the last stage of a long and varied journey that began with the first UK screening of The Piano. Never having been an ardent fan of conventional ‘bodice rippers’ or nostalgic fossilisations of a past we never had, I was surprised by my reaction to the costumes.”

“Indeed, Travis had been a model as a college student, working his way through John Jay Criminal College, posing for the bodice-ripper covers of romantic novels.”

“These novels became known as "bodice rippers" because they were much more sexually explicit than earlier romances had been. Instead of experiencing a delicious kiss or a mystical wedding night at the end of the story, heroines in the bodice rippers were regularly ravished by the hero. Some feminist critics objected to these books as a romanticization of rape, but readers identified strongly with the heroine's powerlessness as a woman in a rigidly patriarchal society. Unlike the sweet virgins of earlier romances, the heroines of the bodice rippers were notoriously feisty.”

“Grazia [Deledda] discovered early that a short story appeared in the last pages of each magazine; these tales were of a decidedly Romantic bent, much like today's supermarket bodice-rippers.”

“[M]y mother chased her dream of becoming a character in one of those frontier romance novels—buckskin bodice rippers, she called them—that she so adored.”

“They stubbornly hung on to the idea that Outlander was a Harlequinesque bodiceripper that would only appeal to middle-age bored housewives.”

CEFR level