Life Like Dolls: The Collector Doll Phenomenon and the Lives of the Women Who Love Them [Paperback]

A. F. Robertson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 19, 2003 | ISBN-10: 0415944511 | ISBN-13: 978-0415944519 | Edition: 1

Exploring the nexus of emotions, consumption and commodification that porcelain collectible dolls represent, A. F. Robertson tracks the rise of this multi-billion dollar market; interviews the women themselves; and visits their clubs, fairs and chat-rooms to understand what makes the dolls so irresistible. Lifelike but freakish; novelties that profess to be antiques; pricey kitsch: These dolls are the product of powerful emotions and big business.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

The enormous popularity of the Cabbage Patch and American Girl dolls has not gone unnoticed, either by major corporations or by anthropologists. Fascinated by this multibillion-dollar business, Robertson invested time probing the psychology not only of doll collectors but also of the companies that manufacture and advertise dolls. Robertson begins with a little history of the use of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century dolls as clothing models, and then continues with analysis of the allure of dolls' physical amenities and the way owners often emotionally bond with their dolls. The typical height of dolls is 14 inches, and their eyes and hair are usually the most compelling features (i.e., the main reasons they are bought). Yet it is by entering the bedrooms and living rooms of America that the author becomes privy to the behind-the-scenes details, where he and readers learn why these kinds of collectibles are purchased, from filling up empty nests to recapturing a sense of belonging. A fascinating look at the inner longings of collectors. Barbara Jacobs
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review

By turns insightful, probing, provocative, and thoughtful, Life Like Dolls explores the richly metaphoric meaning of dolls and the inner lives of the people who collect them.
–Yona Zeldis McDonough, editor of The Barbie Chronicles: A Living Doll Turns Forty

Doll-collecting, and the industry that supports it, moves from appearing to be a literal curiosity to the source of convincing insights about family, gender, and aging in contemporary life....[A]n account that is compelling, deep, and goes to the heart of general questions about humankind that anthropology has distinctively raised.
–George E. Marcus, editor of Critical Anthropology Now: Unexpected Contexts, Shifting Constituencies, Changing Agendas

Robertson shows how the doll serves to encapsulate everything from guilty pleasure and longing to big business and consumer commodification. A work of originality and verve.
–Harvey Molotch, author of Where Stuff Comes From

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Routledge; 1 edition (October 19, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0415944511
• ISBN-13: 978-0415944519
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.3 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #412,374 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #88 in Books > Crafts, Hobbies & Home > Antiques & Collectibles > Dolls

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Tedious and repetitive, June 7, 2004

By 

Stephanie Spika (Long Beach, CA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Life Like Dolls: The Collector Doll Phenomenon and the Lives of the Women Who Love Them (Paperback)

Just for Dr. Robertson, this review is gonna ramble...
This is the kind of book that makes serious anthropologists cringe. This is the kind of book that makes the "hard science" scientists make jokes about social "scientists." I appreciate Dr. Robertson's attempt to appeal to the largest possible readership in order to sell the book, but, unfortunately, wandering around in the middle just made the book tedious, repetitive, rambling, poorly presented, and way too generalized. Instead of scientific conclusions (or even, methods) Dr. R. makes huge sweeping generalizations about what his little computer-generated statistics tell him! I was embarrassed for him. I understand that students were major contributors, so maybe I should keep that in mind. Congratulations, you can all say you are "published" contributors on your resumes now, through the kindness of Dr. Robertson. But, leaving the students out of it, Dr. Robertson often wandered off the subject (Porcelain Collector Dolls) into other areas and kinds of doll collecting, sometimes seeming to imply that other kinds of doll collecting are just as weird and demented as PCD collecting. Maybe so, but other kinds of doll collecting should have waited for another book, instead of muddying the water in this volume, generalizing, summarizing, pontificating, and just making the book an exasperating trial to read. That said, I do think the subject is a fascinating one, and I think the manufacturers would be even more fun to study! When I first started working in antique and vintage doll repair, my first response to the PCD's I saw in doll magazines was the same one Dr. Robertson most often encountered outside of the PCD collecting "world:" Eeeee-ee-eew; nauseating; weird! Who could be collecting these dolls? Well, now I know who they are, and that could have been summarized in an essay. After checking out some of those dolls at doll shows, I began to think about their usefulness in the Los Angeles area carpool lanes. Hmmm...might be worth the investment, but would I be strangely compelled to keep buying them?? Have a trunk full? More in carseats in the back? I doubt it. I don't exactly fit the "profile," and don't collect PCD's, although I am the "right" age and I do have a few other kinds of dolls lying around the house. I've never felt the "empty nest" syndrome (who first made that up, anyway?) -- I was thrilled when I finally had more time and a spare room to use for my avocation repairing dolls. I also think it's telling to note that the most often quoted sources in the book are both very out of date; why Dr. R. used studies from 1896 (Hall and Ellis) and Freud, who isn't even in the bibliography, and who no one takes seriously anymore anyway, is really beyond me. I was mildly entertained by Dr. Robertson's discussion of "hyperreality," but it was just one among many concepts he was handing out as scientific fact. It's fine to hypothesize and speculate, but he forgot to tell us that the WHOLE BOOK is a hypothesis with a lot of speculation thrown in! This is what my mathematician husband calls "telling stories!" God help anyone who believes this information hook, line, and sinker! The frequency charts in the appendix were really disappointing and will go over the heads of most readers; why didn't he just use bar graphs? Chapter 8 was the best, most organized, and most interesting section in the book; I wish I'd read it first and saved myself a lot of time.

7 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars terrible, November 6, 2006

A Kid's Review

This review is from: Life Like Dolls: The Collector Doll Phenomenon and the Lives of the Women Who Love Them (Paperback)

this was a horrible book first of all i just turned 14 and i have been collecting porcelin dolls since i was 5 years old and this idiot is trying to say that doll collectors have mental problems...this book really distured and upset me when i read it lkast year and it made every one who know that i collect dolls think that i have pervesed tendencies if i could give it 0 stars i most certainly would

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Doll Lovers Beware!, September 5, 2009

By 

Miss Mommy (Maryland, USA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Life Like Dolls: The Collector Doll Phenomenon and the Lives of the Women Who Love Them (Paperback)

Doll collecting is a fun, enjoyable, innocent, creative, and time-honored hobby. This book tries its best to take all the fun out of it, and, taking a superior and patronizing tone, to psychoanalyze doll collectors, of which I am one. I would also have rated this book 0 stars, if possible. I didn't finish it and I got rid of it. AVOID this book, doll lovers of all ages!!