women’s behavior

Female Body as Commodity

~ Antonia ~ Leave a comment

Tristan begins her chapter on sex workers of London in the Victorian Period with an explanation of why they exist in the first place. Her argument is that all sex work is survival sex work. She says that their existence stems from the inequality of the sexes, particularly in England. The culture that places stigma on pre-marital sex for women, but does not instill that stigma for men invites this job as a remedy. It means that men can seduce or abuse young women with no risk to themselves, but at the cost of destroying those women’s lives. A woman must marry in order to assure a living for herself , because she is not allowed the same “occupations and professions” that allow for a living wage. However, in doing so she gives up her existence. Tristan describes this as choosing “between oppression and infamy.”

Tristan also blames the materialism and capitalism of an industrialized England. The more money accumulated by the upper classes, the poorer the poorer classes get. The more money these men get, the more they have to spend on the sex workers that they are creating by exploiting the poor classes that they come from. She describes seeing in a “finish” a beautiful Irish girl, who later that night she saw on the floor, her dress ruined, because people kept throwing drinks on her. She also describes seeing men create orgies in these finishes, in clear view of others, because they paid so much money that they should have that right. Tristan is describing a market of women’s bodies; where, rich men use them as things to consume and throw away, a growing symptom of the wastefulness of the industrial age. The actual humanity of these women do not matter, and is in fact ignored. When a sex worker is found struggling for breath after a john abuses her for allegedly giving him a disease, the man is not charged with any crimes towards the woman, but rather a crime for disturbing the peace of the neighborhood.
Hood’s poem, describing the body of a sex worker who committed suicide by jumping into the river, takes a stance on the “purity” of this woman. The speaker says to think “Not of the stains of her, / All that remains of her / Now is pure womanly.” And in the final stanza says “Owning her weakness, / Her evil behaviour, / And leaving, with meekness, /Her sins to her Saviour!” The implication of these words is that only through death could this woman receive any kind of forgiveness. She has done the noble thing by taking herself out of this world and placing her soul in the hands of God. Tristan says in her essay “To brave death is nothing; but what a death faces a prostitute! […] moral death all the time, and scorn for herself! I repeat: there is something sublime in it, or else it is madness!” The poem sees something sublime in her death, but sees her life as pitiful. It demands respect for her dead body that she would not have been given in life.

Stir-Crazy Governesses

~ lazoe1 ~ Leave a comment

According to the article, governesses were those women who were unhappy with their current state in life and who left “their quiet homes for the school-rooms of halls and castles” (569). The problem with these women is that Victorian society took advantage of the fact that there was a surplus in the number of governesses versus the number of positions. These women, who only hoped for a better education and maybe a better life, were left with low paying salaries and the burden of being the “hired strangers” (570). Governesses became the lowest class:

Many ladies would not dare treat their maids as they behave to the teacher of their children. Why? The maid had a broad field before her; she can afford to turn upon her mistress. The governess must endure all things. A low marriage or a slow death are her only loopholes of escape. (575)

The article then goes on to discuss the dissatisfaction that governesses deal with throughout their lives. They are unable to return home and unwilling to be paid any mind by their employers; “Governesses are usually a fretful, discontented race” (574).

Though Brontë’s character, Jane, is absolutely one of those discontented women that the appendix article talks about, she is saved when she attends Lowood. Jane had a very rough start in life, being orphaned and raised by an abusive family, and only dreamed of venturing out and knowing more of the world. Lowood gives Jane the tools she needs to apply and get her position at Thornfield Hall. Instead of following the “norm,” Jane is saved when she leaves the Reeds’. All that awaited her there was abuse with no affection, save that of Bessie, one of the maids. Jane truly benefits when she attends Lowood, especially after the typhus incident when other members of the community get involved and Mr. Brockelhurst is removed as sole caretaker of the girls. Jane never once regrets leaving her lavish home behind for the simplicity of Lowood.

Jane is happy at Thornfield Hall — Jane had “heard of the treatment of governesses” (Brontë 163). After some time, she finds that she still “desire[s] more of practical experience than [she] possessed, more of intercourse with [her] kind, [and] acquaintance with variety of character” (Brontë 178). It is right at the point that Jane begins to feel stir-crazy, the way the article predicted, that Mr. Rochester comes into the picture. Mr. Rochester does not treat Jane in the conventional way; instead of ignoring Jane he takes pleasure in her company and she in his. I feel as though the introduction of Mr. Rochester at this point in time is Brontë going against the ideas in the Fraser Magazine. Jane is not the crazy governess who will have to be sent to the asylum, she is witty and perceptive. The relationship between Jane and her employer is very odd, but Jane finds that she dreads the day Mr. Rochester departs because she will know what it truly is to be alone.

Works Cited

Brontë, Charlotte. Jane Eyre. Ed. Richard Nemesvari. Toronto: Broadview, 1999. Print.

“Hints on the Modern Governess System.” Fraser’s Magazine November 1844: 567-577. Print

Victorian Opinions on Abortion

~ lazoe1 ~ Leave a comment

Abortion is a topic that has been argued both for, and against, for hundreds of years; nowadays the argument is pro-life versus pro-choice. The article that I read on Lee Jackson’s “Victorian Dictionary” is basically a very long rant that negates the practice of abortions. Augustus Gardiner, a physician in 1894, is the author of such an article. From the very first line we see his viewpoint on the topic of abortion; “Of all the sins, physical and moral, against man and God, I know of none so utterly to be condemned as the very common one of the destruction of the child while yet in the womb of the mother.” The article then goes on to talk about all the places in the world that practice infanticide and the reasons for such a practice. He mentions places like Greece and China and Sparta, places that practice infanticide due to deformities or religious practices, etc. These places are meant to serve as juxtaposition to England because the women in England were getting abortions due to “selfish” reasons. Gardiner states that the women would rather face “the heinousness of the sin; the possibility of death immediate and painful; the likelihood of prolonged illness and future debility; [and] the chance of a blighted being constantly before the sight…” rather than have their children. Gardiner really plays on the ethos of the people of the time by focusing on the fact that killing a child is an act against God.

The only credibility Gardiner has is that fact that he is an actual physician who probably encounters women seeking abortions on a daily basis. Unfortunately, it is known that the Victorian era was a time when women were seen as property whose only real purpose was bearing children and staying at home to cook and clean and raise those same children. Though I am not condoning abortions, I feel as though the women who were brave enough to seek abortions or even desperate enough to attempt to do it themselves were really women speaking out and taking back a piece of themselves that was given away the second they said, “I do.” Gardiner also contradicts himself at times. He states, “we can forgive the poor, deluded girl-seduced, betrayed, abandoned-who, in her wild frenzy, destroys the mute evidence of her guilt…But for the married shirk, who disregards her divinely ordained duty, we have nothing but contempt…” If abortion were truly evil then wouldn’t it make sense that it would be a sin to every woman who had one? Not just the married ones? This quote further supports my idea that his real anger is directed at the married women who did not really exist in the eyes of the law and of men.

Works Cited

“Victorian London – Sex – Abortion – Opinions.” The Conjugal Relationships as Regards Personal Health & Hereditary Well-being. Victorian London Dictionary.  Web. 14 February 2016.

Lee Jackson’s Abortion Article: Here

At the Ladies Club

~ Antonia ~ 4 Comments

After learning about the Gentleman’s Club in the “Victorian Period” game, I decided to look into the “Ladies Club” section of the Victorian Dictionary. There was only one article in the section, and it was by the satirical conservative newspaper Punch. However, through the mockery that they give to the idea, they expose exactly what they fear women obtaining. The Ladies Club did not even actually exist, but the piece speculates on what might occur if it did, and how it’s possible formation incites “fearful questions.” Their first question is if there will be a club committee, and if there is how many women will be allowed to speak at once. This betrays a fear of women organizing and having a voice completely outside the control of men. They then question whether there will be a smoking room, and if “cigars will suffer to be lighted” or, for fear of illness, only “the middlest cigarettes.” Not only does this show disgust at the idea of women adopting a symbol of masculinity for their own pleasure, but it doubts whether they will be able to do that, or if their delicate constitutions would prevent it. They then question what women will discuss. Whether it will be topics they feel appropriate, such as “the nursery” and “bonnets,” or if they will talk of more scandalous matters such as love, marriage, and even divorce. In this question they restrict the interests of women to the domestic life. They do not even consider that women may talk about politics, literature, science, or anything outside of marriage and children. They go on, continuing to trivialize women, and their interests, even suggesting that ballots will be represented by cotton balls instead of actual ballots. Perhaps paper is just too heavy. They predict a woman in the club scorning her husband and leaving him to take care of the children for a night, while she takes time for herself. This practice, which men a known to do, is seen as selfish in a woman because her first concern should be the family and not herself. The last point they make on behavior in the club gives a good insight into the male gaze of the period: “what a sensation would be caused on the street pavement, if the Club belles were to congregate about the Club beau-windows, and stare through their eye-glasses every handsome man who passed.” They are revealing an anxiety about being objectified the same way that they objectify women. The entire article shows a fear, not of equality, but of a world where women have power over men in the same way that men have power over women.

Works Cited

“The Ladies Club” Punch. Victorian London Dictionary. Web. 12 February 2016. http://www.victorianlondon.org/women/ladiesclub.htm