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Bond Street in The Romance of a Shop

~ Dea Barbieri

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In Chapter 9 of The Romance of A Shop, Bond Street is mentioned in relation to Sidney Darrell, an influential artist at the Royal Academy. The Royal Academy was a society in Victorian London dedicated to the arts and improving on previous artistic styles. The fact that the sisters are at the Royal Academy in this chapter is a main plot point as it shows the kind of people they have connections to, and how their business may be about to take off.

The sisters grew up in comfortable, I guessed high middle class, surroundings. When their father dies they are forced to come up with a new way to support themselves and they decide to open up their own photography studio. Many of the other characters object to this occupation as suitable for young women, but they do it anyway. I was somewhat surprised when they settled on Baker Street because I already knew from our last exercise that it was in a fairly wealthy part of London, and the sisters seemed to not have much money between the four of them. However, one of the other characters notes that they have to pay up in order to succeed and attract the right kind of loyal cliental among all the other photography studios. Many locations are mentioned several times throughout the first nine chapters, but Bond Street is only mentioned once as being the location of Darrell’s gallery; my book notes that it is an “area of fashionable shops and galleries (114). Looking at the Charles Booth poverty map confirmed that Bond Street was an area for the upper class:

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There wasn’t that much information available on Bond Street other than that it was a mostly commercial area near the Royal Academy and that it was split into “New Bond Street” and “Old Bond Street.” I actually found more information on it in the introductory materials in the front of the book, one being from a chronology of Amy Levy’s life. In 1887, “The University Club for Ladies opens in New Bond Street.” A little more flipping through this introductory material found that Amy Levy was an early member of the club and wrote an essay on women’s clubs as an “established fact of the contemporary cityscape, and as a meeting-ground for old and young, intellectual and fashionable, traditional and modern women” (25). Having the four sisters in the book around people who have their business in Bond Street, I think, is a nod to the progressive part of society that Amy Levy was trying to advocate and push for and shows what kind of people the sisters are. They are new women, Fanny a little more begrudgingly, and they want to have their own stake in the world even if everyone tells them that they shouldn’t, that they’re not allowed. Bond Street is mentioned once so far but it’s a strong statement for Amy Levy to make that women would be known as professionals in that area of Victorian London.

Levy, Amy. The Romance of a Shop. Broadview Press, 2006. Print.

The Charles Booth Online Archive. October 28, 2015. Web.

The Romance of a Shop: Royal Academy

~ Shianne

Screen Shot 2015-10-27 at 5.01.01 PMThe Royal Academy of Arts located in Picadilly was founded in 1768 with the intention of cultivating and improving the arts of painting, sculpting, and architecture. The two main objectives of forming the Academy were to create a “well-regulated” school of design and to host an annual exhibition “to all artists of distinguished merit.” The Royal Academy’s active members (which vary in number time-to-time) are split into Academicians, Associates, and Associate Engravers. The Academicians are painters, sculptors, architects, and engravers. There are also Honorary Members, Honorary Retired Members, and Honorary Foreign Academicians. All members “whose work shows sufficient merit are permitted to contribute to its exhibitions” (Victorian Art).

The Royal Academy chooses its members as so: Associates are chosen through election. Those eligible for election are exhibitors, who are chosen by Academicians at the annual meeting at the Academy. The Academicians are chosen from the associates when a spot opens. As the Royal Academy was established through a charter, as a memorial for George III, all elected individuals must be given the signature of the reigning sovereign. Therefore, no individual membership within the Royal Academy is valid unless approved by the monarch (Victorian Art).

Because the Academy is a Royal establishment, it is unsurprising that those who live in its surrounding neighborhoods are either middle or upper class. Unlike many other areas we’ve looked at, there is no lower middle class or poor inhabitants mixed in. This may be why the crime in the area is so low to nonexistant. While searching the Old Bailey, I found no records of crime related to the Royal Academy.

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How does this relate to the story?

In Chapter 9, the first paragraph mentions that Frank “had invited all the people he knew in London to inspect his pictures and Mr. Oakley’s before they were sent in to the Royal Academy” (111). It is the mentioned that Mr. Oakley isn’t necessarily all that talented or sought after, but that his pictures make it into exhibition and are sold. Because both Frank and Mr. Oakley are artists whose work is shown in the Royal Academy exhibition, it is implied that they are very wealthy.

 

Works Cited

“Victorian Art Institutions: Academies, Schools, Galleries.” The Victorian Web. N.p., 20 July 2015. Web. 27 Oct. 2015.

The Romance of a Shop

~ Mike

This story is a tale of a group of “New Women”. New women were women who spoke out against the gender rules placed on them by society. So in this case it was four sisters who grouped together and began their own photography business. Women having a business was crazy in this time period. Let alone four women all running the same business. No men were involved, you go girls! These sisters were incredibly powerful, along with speaking up against societies rules they fought just after their father died. So mourning and fighting for their right to own a business and make money.

Baker Street station after doing some research doesn’t really seem to be to crazy. Like after looking at the Old Bailey site, it just seemed to be about ten crimes and all were like minor theft. Which kind of makes sense considering it was in the more well a do part of town. Also at no point in the story did it ever give off the vibe that they were in a crime infested part of town. The only “crime” occurring was the ones that the patriarchy was deciding was a crime. if anything they were stopping themselves from committing actual crimes such as prostitution.

This story is all about the new women and their fight. So the areas that the story mention I highly doubt, would be portrayed in a poor and crime infested part of town. If they are trying to push their cause, the new women are probably trying to show it off as glamorously as possible without having it be to glamorous because then the story would hook its male readers. Male readers would blow it off as some fairy tale that women were thinking up to try and break free of their control. So I believe the new women were incredibly smart and just played enough into the wonders of women’s rights without trying to grasp for too much. The Romance of a Shop is a great story to show off New Women literature.