"Summations have the somewhat artificial tendency to round off a book (and an analysis) that was charged to describe something multi-faceted. Susanne Kord has thus quite rightly chosen the form of the analytical essay. […] Eschewing generalizations and broad strokes, practicing the ‘non-unity of history’ (Hausen), Susanne Kord offers concise, thoughtful, and—in her treatment of scholarship—exceptionally masterful and stimulating insights into ideas about female deviance at the threshold of modernity. Her book inspires further discussion about the question to what extent modern penal systems can be understood as expressions of humaneness or rather […] as internalizations of social, moral and gender-constituting codes that should be resisted to this day."

-Dr Achim Saupe, Zentrum für Zeithistorische Forschung, Potsdam

"This smart and original book uses readings of many different kinds of texts to shed light on conceptions of gender in the German transition to modernity...Kord's vivid writing style enhances the book's appeal...This book is a notable exploration of the revealing underside of modern European culture."
-Joy Wiltenburg, H-German