Olympe de Gouges

Olympe de Gouges

Olympe de Gouges was born on May 7th, 1748. She was a women's right activist, fought against slavery, and conveyed most of her views through writing. She wrote plays, pamphlets, and stories. A notable document was "French Declaration of Rights for Women and Citizen", a response to the document “The French Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen” . These two documents mirror each other in what rights they convey, with de Gouges' putting an emphasis on the fact that women should hold the same rights as men, and should not be pushed aside.

She was married when she was sixteen, but after her husband died in 1766 was when she really started to make a name for herself– literally. She changed her name from her birth name of "Marie Gouze" to the much more known name of Olympe de Gouges. It was during this time she started writing, putting a focus on the social issues of the day. She vowed to never marry again, and kept this promise. She and her husband had one son, Pierre.

She worked hard for the rights of many groups, not just women. She wrote several plays addressing slavery, fought for the rights of inheritence for children born out of wedlock, and for the legalization of divorce. She wanted equal rights no matter race or gender, but did still support the idea of a king. She wanted France to have a constitutional monarchy, but this view is what led to her arrest and death. She was killed by guillotine on November 3rd, 1793, in Paris, France, for her defense of King Louis XVI.

Souces:
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Olympe-de-Gouges
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olympe_de_Gouges
https://www.college.columbia.edu/core/content/olympe-de-gouges

Image Source:
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Olympe-de-Gouges

Theater Royal in Bath

In 1765 St James Theatre was granted a Royal Patent, making it the first provincial Theatre Royal in not only Bath but England. There were many plays that took place in this building, such as "King Richard the III", "Macbeth", and "The Grecian Daughter". The theatre became so popular that the tickets were selling out every night and therefore more space was needed. At this time, in 1805, a new building was put up.

This building has a direct correlation with one of Jane Austen's popular books, Northanger Abbey. "Austen scholars are generally of the opinion that [a] scene takes place in [Northanger Abbey] that takes place in [the Theater Royal in Bath]. This is because "Jane Austen visited Bath several times in the late 18th Century...  She was a regular visitor to the Theatre Royal in Orchard Street during the last five years of its existence". It is believed that she "used the interior as a backdrop in her novel Northanger Abbey".

The citation from Northanger Abbey:

At the beginning of the fifth, however, the sudden view of Mr Henry Tilney and his father, joining a party in the opposite box, recalled her to anxiety and distress. The stage could no longer excite genuine merriment — no longer keep her whole attention. Every other look upon an average was directed towards the opposite box; and, for the space of two entire scenes, did she thus watch Henry Tilney, without being once able to catch his eye... 

suggests a setting that directly reflects that of the Theatre Royal in Bath. Scholars argue that "The side boxes at the lower level each side of the Theatre had seats (the upper two levels were standing galleries), and Austen scholars are generally of the opinion that this scene takes place in them, probably because Miss Austen’s actual situation in society would most likely place her attendance there.  However, at the time the book was written, the Theatre also had grand boxes at the upper rear, arranged in a semi-circle with the two extreme boxes also facing each other.  The social (and financial) status of the fictitious Allens and Tilneys would have made these boxes more likely of their patronage". 

Citations: 

“Theatre Royal 1750 - 1805.” Old Theatre Royal Tours & Masonic Museum, oldtheatreroyal.com/museum/theatre-royal-1750-1805/

Vindication of the Rights of Woman

In January 1792, Mary Wollstonecraft published A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, which laid out the tenets of what today we call ‘equality’ or ‘liberal’ feminist theory. She further promoted a new model of the nation grounded on a family politics produced by egalitarian marriages. Image: A Vindication of the Rights of Woman title page from the first American edition, 1792 (Library of Congress).  This image is in the public domain in the United States because its copyright has expired.

Articles

Anne K. Mellor, "On the Publication of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman"

Related Articles

Ghislaine McDayter, "On the Publication of William Godwin’s Memoirs of the Author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, 1798"

Reign of Terror

A period of violence that occurred a few years after the start of the French Revolution. Image: Anonymous, Portrait of Maximilien de Robespierre (c. 1790), Carnavalet Museum. This image is in the public domain in the United States because its copyright has expired.

On 5 September 1793, the National Convention, France’s ruling body from 1793 to 1795, officially put into effect terror measures in order to subdue opposition to and punish insufficient support for the revolution and the new regime. From the autumn of 1793 until the summer of 1794, thousands of people across the country were imprisoned and executed (including the Queen) under the ruthless leadership of Maximilien Robespierre. The guillotine, particularly the one in Paris’s Place de la Révolution, served as the bloody emblem of the fear tactics that began to manifest themselves first in the formation of the Committee of Public Safety (6 April 1793) and subsequently in the implementation of the Law of Suspects (17 September 1793). The Terror ended on 27 July 1794 with the overthrow of Robespierre, who was guillotined the next day.

Articles

Diane Piccitto, "On 1793 and the Aftermath of the French Revolution"

Memoirs of the Author of a Vindication

On January 1798, publication of William Godwin’s Memoirs of the Author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman. The publication of this first biography of Wollstonecraft causes a scandal and Godwin publishes a second “corrected” edition of the Memoirs in the summer of the same year.

Articles

Ghislaine McDayter, "On the Publication of William Godwin’s Memoirs of the Author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, 1798"

Related Articles

Anne K. Mellor, "On the Publication of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman"

Victorian Linguistics

The 1800’s is when English truly blossomed into what we consider “iconic victorian” linguistics. This type of English is much closer to modern English and as such makes it much easier to “interpret”. Reading novels from this time period is much easier than, say, Shakespeare. Another reason that it tends to be easier to read is that grammar had solidified much more at this point.   

Some commonly used words during the Victorian era had more of a Latin root or polish to them. Here’s the history of some of my favorite Victorian vocabulary words, you may notice words on this list are common even today but they were even more common vernacular in the Victorian era. 

Cupidity -- an inordinate desire for wealth (derived from the Latin word Cupere -- to desire) 

Pecuniary -- Consisting of or measured in money (derived from the Latin word Pecuniam -- Money) 

Character -- (in the Victorian sense) A person of renown and polish

These are just a few of my favorite words that I will be highlighting. 

One of the authors that was best known for Victorian linguistics (aside from Austen) is Charles Dickens who lived from 1812 to 1870. When I began my research on this topic I found more about his particular linguistic style in the Victorian Era than almost any other author. I had never considered his works to be Victorian before because they are so palatable. But I suppose that’s simply because the language was more palatable than Shakespeare and other classical authors of the time. 

Jane Austen's time in Bath

So much of what we know about Jane Austen's opinion of her time in Bath is colored by her negative comments of it in letters and her writing. Indeed, even my first COVE post for Bath on the map talked about the different experiences for Jane in Bath from when she visited versus when she lived there with her parents. But I found an interesting article that goes into a lot of the contradictions of Jane saying she hated Bath related to some of her experience there.

First, it should be noted that her move to Bath in 1801 was a decision by her parents who were retiring there, in part because of her mother's health needs. At first she was horrified, and Jane Austen scholars know that this makes sense given the general themes of home, smaller village life and a general distrust of city life in her writing. But as the Jane Austen scholar Paula Bryne points out, "Austen’s residence in Bath in the years 1801-06 coincided with one of the most prosperous and exciting times in the history of the local stage" (17). But not just with the stage, but with the culture there in general. While Austen was critical of the stage (we can see this in Mansfield Park), Bryne points out all the mentions in letters and journals by Austen that she often went to the theater and even had a favorite actor.

Some of the aspects of Bath during that time can be found in the newspapers of the time. Forgive the longer quotation, but I find it helps color what Bath was like during this time for Austen. "Amongst the advertisements for tooth whitening, false hair, lotions for the face to reduce freckles, muslin dresses trimmed with lace; between the countless medical cures for rheumatism, gout, sprains, bruises, and women’s ailments (the celebrated Cordial of Balm of Gilead, curing wind in the stomach and the bowels, and all nervous complaints), [Jane] would discover an array of enticing urban pleasures for the discerning tourist or civilized inhabitant. Tickets for the Assembly rooms were on offer, boxes at the Theatre Royal, musical concerts, and of course the pleasure gardens with fireworks and illuminations" (16). Between all of that and the balls, it's clear that Bath was the social center of society for a lot of people.

But how are we supposed to truly see Jane's experience when we have accounts like these: “Here I am once more in this Scene of Dissipation & vice, and I begin already to find my Morals corrupted” (17), but also like this (referring to her favorite stage actor perhaps leaving Bath and being quite worried about it): "Elliston . . . has just succeeded to a considerable fortune on the death of an Uncle. I would not have it enough to take him from the Stage" (18). I argue that we can see how she truly feels with her writing. Home and leaving home is a major theme in many of her novels, and while there does seem to be genuine enthusiasm behind Catherine's love of Bath in Northanger Abbey, her later works and how they often view moving around as a lack of stability. Indeed, Susan Morgan argues that this reflects Jane's life, in that her moving to Bath and then moving around quite a bit with her mother after her father's death wasn't ideal. She says, "all this changing around hardly adds up to a stable, in the sense of settled and static, domestic universe as the geographic setting of Austen’s work" (2). Given that much of the drama of her works lies in the nuances of the more settled domestic universe, it's clear to see that while Jane may have found Bath exciting and diverting, there may not be as much time for nuance either.

Works cited:

Byrne, Paula.  “‘The unmeaning luxuries of Bath’: Urban Pleasures in Jane Austen’s World.”  Persuasions 26 (2004): 13-26.

Morgan, Susan.  “Adoring the Girl Next Door: Geography in Austen’s Novels.”  Persuasions On-Line 21.1 (2000).

Battle of Waterloo

This battle was fought in Waterloo, Belgium on June 18, 1815. This is an important battle as it is the battle in which Napolean was defeated, thus ending his expansion plans for his empire. In this battle, Napolean fought against an army with soldiers from all over Europe, including but not limited to, the UK, Prussia, and the Netherlands. The reason he lost was due to a critical strategy error on Napolean's part. He waited until midday to order his troups to attack the enemy, after waiting for the waterlogged battleground to dry up more. Because of this, the forces Napeolean was fighting had time to get fortification with nearly 30000 more soldiers coming to aide in the fight against the French. It was because of this that Napeolean did not have enough forces to survive fighting against his enemies, and by the end of the day he had lost. This battle signified the end of his 100 day long march in which he expanded his control and power, taking over areas surrounding France in order to grow his empire. 

Source: https://www.history.com/topics/british-history/battle-of-waterloo

Mary Shelley Writes and Publishes "Frankenstein"

Locked indoors due to a rainstorm in 1816, Mary Shelley, along with her husband, Percy, and their friend, Lord Byron, had a ghost story competition. Impressed by the story Mary told based off a dream she had had, Lord Byron and Percy encouraged her to write it down. Shelley finished writing in summer of 1817, and published Frankenstein or The Modern Prometheus on January 1, 1818 anonymously due to fear of how the public would receive a novel written by a woman as well as the philosophical ideas contained therein that challenged Romantic ideals of beauty and nature. It wasn't until the second edition of the novel in 1823 that Shelley revealed herself as the true author, however, despite scholars' admissions to the contrary, rumors spread that Percy had written Frankenstein instead of Mary, and some of these rumors persist even still today. This is due in part to Percy's involvement in the writing by offering corrections and revisions in her notebooks, though that is all they were. Indeed, much of the ongoing conversation regarding Mary Shelley refuses to discuss Shelley in her own right and instead focuses on her relationship with Percy, or her mother's or father's literary accomplishments, or even stories critics claim to have inspired her iconic monster (such as the Greek myth of Pygmalion). The fact remains that Mary Shelley authored Frankenstein and is (at least in part) responsible for the birth of modern science fiction as we know it today.

Women's Fashion Change in the Romantic Period

Beginning in 1820, Women’s fashion began to change from the Empire style which had dresses waistline falling an inch or two below the bust and having slightly puffy sleeves. Empire style also included gores, which are triangular-shaped segments made to create a flaring effect on a dress. Between 1820-1825 Women’s fashion continued to hold most of the Empire-style designs as the only change was the waistline dropping a few inches and the sleeves getting puffier. Susan Jarrett, a historical fashion blogger, described the early 1820s fashion as “a transition period between the former Empire style and the new Romantic style. During this period, the waistline slowly descended back to its normal position as skirts gradually increased in fullness. Skirts of the 1820s were typically gored– or cut in an A-shape with the narrowest part of the skirt near the waist slowly increasing in width as the skirt progressed to the hem” (Jarrett). Around this time, Romantic period fashion had a dropped waistline, puffy sleeves, and widened skirts that still had gores. However, in 1825 the romantic fashion went through a dramatic change as the waistline continued to drop until it was at the natural waist in 1825. “As the waistline dropped, the skirt and sleeves widened; by 1825, the early Romantic silhouette was established with a natural waistline, large puffed sleeves, and a wide skirt with an increasing number of gore” (Franklin). As the waistline dropped, the sleeves and skirt continued to widen. Around 1827, instead of having gores, skirts were pleated at the waistband to create a cinched waist effect. As well as this, intricate designs of twisting fabrics were added to the hem of dresses, making them much heavier. Dresses went from having a high waistline, puffy sleeves, and much more flowing material to cinched waists resting on natural waistlines, puffier sleeves, and heaving skirts that included intricate, fabric designs. 

Works Cited:

Franklin, Harper. “1820-1829.” Fashion History Timeline, 27 May 2020, fashionhistory.fitnyc.edu/1820-1829/#:~:text=century%2C%20decade%20overview-,OVERVIEW,styles%20borrowed%20from%20past%20centuries. 

Jarrett, Susan. “The Romantic Era 1820-1850.” Maggie May Clothing- Fine Historical Fashion, 14 June 2020, maggiemayfashions.com/calicoball/fashionhistory/the-romantic-era-1820-1850/. 

William Burke & William Hare Murder Spree

“Burking” is a verb meaning: “to murder, as by suffocation, so as to leave no or few marks of violence” (Dictionary.com). The term originates from William Burke, a 19^th century serial killer who, along with his accomplice, William Hare, “murdered at least 16 people in Edinburgh, in order to sell their fresh bodies to the anatomist Robert Knox” (Tarlow 216). The murders took place in 1828 which was 77 years after the passage of The Murder Act which made it legal to dissect and study the bodies of executed criminals for the sake of anatomical research (Gül and Sahinoglu 128). The legacy of this act, of course, can be seen in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, as Victor primarily uses just such bodies to construct his creature. Eventually, though, the demand for corpses became greater than the supply, and the trade of the “Resurrection Men” (Evans 1190), who were essentially just graverobbers that sold the bodies they dug to anatomists, became rather lucrative. 

William Burke and William Hare “knew of grave robbers and would have robbed graves themselves; however, they found it too hard and dangerous” (Gül and Sahinoglu 130), so they instead opted to go on a murder spree. Said spree began when Hare’s renter died (of natural causes) and Hare and Burke decided to sell his body to Dr. Knox, who was one of Scotland’s most successful professors of anatomy at the time (Gül and Sahinoglu). After being paid for their first body and seeing how much money they stood to gain, the pair “[enticed] at least 15 unknown wayfarers into the lodging house, where they got them intoxicated and then smothered them” (Jenkins 1) and sold their bodies. Eventually, the disappearances of their victims began to attract attention, and they were caught. Their trial took place on Christmas Eve, 1828 (Evans 1190). Hare turned against Burke, testifying against him in exchange for immunity (Tarlow 216), and Burke was subsequently hung on January 28, 1829 (Evans 1190). Despite the unfortunate fact that Hare does not seemed to have paid for his crimes at all, karmic justice was at least served for Burke, when, following his execution, his body was “sent for anatomical dissection” and it was “[subjected] to the same fate as those of his victims” (Tarlow 216). These murders were especially significant, because they “caused a national furore of fear and anger, which became known as Burkophobia” (Richardson 161) and this “furore” eventually led to the passage of the Anatomy Act of 1832, “which decreed that the bodies of unclaimed paupers who had died in elderly care homes and hospitals be given to licensed anatomists for dissection” (Gül and Sahinoglu 128). Even this act, however did not rectify the body shortage, which would persist until WWII  (Richardson 161).

 Works Cited

“Burke.” Dictionary.com Unabridged, Random House INC, 2021, https://www.dictionary.com/browse/burking. Accessed 1 April 2021.

Evans, Alun. “William Hare the Murderer.” International Journal of Epidemiology, vol. 39, no. 5, Oct. 2010, pp. 1190–1192. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=edb&AN=55117913&site=eds-live.

Gül, Senay and Sahinoglu, Serap. “Mystery of Anatomy: Robert Knox.” Anatomy: International Journal of Experimental & Clinical Anatomy, vol. 13, no. 2, Aug. 2019, pp. 126–135. EBSCOhost, doi:10.2399/ana.19.062.

Jenkins, John Philip. "William Burke and William Hare.”  Encyclopedia Britannica, 27 Jul. 2011, https://www.britannica.com/biography/William-Burke-and-William-Hare. Accessed 1 April 2021.

Richardson, Ruth. “Human Dissection and Organ Donation: A Historical and Social Background.” Mortality, vol. 11, no. 2, May 2006, pp. 151–165. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1080/13576270600615419.

Tarlow, Sarah. “Curious Afterlives: The Enduring Appeal of the Criminal Corpse.” Mortality, vol. 21, no. 3, Aug. 2016, pp. 210–228. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1080/13576275.2016.1181328.