Women, Periodicals and Print Culture in Britain, 1830s–1900s

Alexis Easley is Professor of English at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota. She is the author of First-Person Anonymous: Women Writers and Victorian Print Media, 1830–70 (2004) and Literary Celebrity, Gender, and Victorian Authorship, 1850–1914 (2011). She has also co-edited four books, most recently Women, Periodicals, and Print Culture in Britain, 1830s–1900s, with Clare Gill and Beth Rodgers (2019). Her most recent book publication is New Media and the Rise of the Popular Woman Writer, 1832–60 (2021). This project was a 2019 recipient of the Linda H. Peterson Prize awarded by the Research Society for Victorian Periodicals. She is currently at work on a biography of Eliza Cook. Clare Gill is Lecturer in Victorian Literature at the University of St Andrews. She is the author of Olive Schreiner and the Politics of Print (forthcoming, Edinburgh University Press), General Editor of The Edinburgh Edition of the Works of Olive Schreiner (forthcoming, Edinburgh University Press) and volume editor of Olive Schreiner’s Trooper Peter Halket of Mashonaland and Selected Journalism (forthcoming, Edinburgh University Press). Beth Rodgers is Senior Lecturer in Nineteenth-Century Literature at Aberystwyth University, Wales, UK. She is the author of Adolescent Girlhood and Literary Culture at the Fin de Siècle: Daughters of Today (Palgrave, 2016), which received Special Mention in the University English Book Prize in 2017, and co-editor of Women, Periodicals and Print Culture in Britain, 1830s–1900s (Edinburgh University Press, 2019) and Children’s Literature on the Move: Nations, Translations, Migrations (Four Courts, 2013). She has also published widely on the Irish author, L.T. Meade.

This is a wide-ranging, insightful, engaging and, above all, lucidly written collection by a group of scholars at the top of their profession. It is, in short, outstanding. We shall be reading, consulting and learning from this volume for years to come.

• List of IllustrationsAcknowledgmentsIntroduction: Women, Periodicals, and Print Culture in the Victorian Period - Alexis Easley, Clare Gill, Beth RodgersPart I: (Re)Imagining Domestic Life Introduction1. The Rise and Rise of the Domestic Magazine: Femininity at Home in Popular Periodicals - Margaret Beetham2. Regulating Servants in Victorian Women’s Print Media - Kathryn Ledbetter3. Women Editors’ Transnational Networks in the Englishwoman’s Domestic Magazine and Myra’s Journal - Marianne Van Remoortel4. Women and Family Health in the Mid-Victorian Family Magazine - Claire Furlong5. Negotiating Female Identity in Nineteenth-Century Ireland - Elizabeth Tilley6. Women and the Welsh Newspaper Press: The Cambrian News and the Western Mail, 1870–95 - Tom O’MalleyPart II: Constructing Modern Girls and Young WomenIntroduction7. Promoting a Do-It-Yourself Spirit: Samuel Beeton’s Young Englishwoman - Jennifer Phegley8. Claiming Medicine as a Profession for Women: The English Woman’s Journal’s Campaign for Female Doctors - Teja Varma Pusapati9. Encouraging Charitable Work and Membership in the Girls’ Friendly Society through British Girls’ Periodicals - Kristine Moruzi10. ‘Welcome and Appeal for the "Maid of Dundee"’: Constructing the Female Working-Class Bard in Ellen Johnston’s Correspondent Poetry, 1862–7 - Suz Garrard11. The Editor of the Period: Alice Corkran, the Girl’s Realm, and the Woman Editor - Beth Rodgers12. The ‘Most-Talked-Of Creature in the World’: The ‘American Girl’ in Victorian Print Culture - Bob NicholsonPart III: Women and Visual CultureIntroduction13. Vicarious Pleasures: Photography, Modernity, and Mid-Victorian Domestic Journalism - Charlotte Boman14. Beauty Advertising and Advice in the Queen and Woman - Michelle J. Smith15. Women of the World: The Lady’s Pictorial and Its Sister Papers - Gerry Beegan16. Rewriting Fairyland: Isabella Bird and the Spectacle of Nineteenth-Century Japan - Andrea Kaston Tange17. Victorian Women Wood Engravers: The Case of Clemence Housman - Lorraine Janzen KooistraPart IV: Making Space for Women Introduction18. Women Journalists and Periodical Spaces - Joanne Shattock19. Making Space for Women’s Work in the Leisure Hour: From Variety to ‘Verity’ - Katherine Malone20. Avatars, Pseudonyms, and the Regulation of Affect: Performing and Occluding Gender in the Pall Mall Gazette - Fionnuala Dillane21. Gender, Anonymity, and Humour in Women’s Writing for Punch - Katy Birch 22. Making Space for Women: The Labour Leader, the Clarion, and the Women’s Column - Deborah Mutch23. By the Fireside: Margaret Oliphant’s Armchair Commentaries - Valerie SandersPart V: Constructing Women Readers and Writers Introduction24. ‘Afford[ing] me a Place’: Recovering Women Poets in Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, 1827–35 - Lindsy Lawrence25. Constructing the Mass-Market Woman Reader and Writer: Eliza Cook and the Weekly Dispatch, 1836–50 - Alexis Easley26. Elizabeth Gaskell and the Habit of Serialisation - Catherine Delafield27. Gender and Genre in Reviews of the Theological Novel - Anne DeWitt28. Reading Poet Amy Levy through Victorian Newspapers - Linda K. Hughes29. ‘I simply write it to order’: L. T. Meade, Sisters of Sherlock, and the Strand Magazine - Clare ClarkePart VI: Intervening in Political Debates Introduction30. Brewing Storms of War, Slavery, and Imperialism: Harriet Martineau’s Engagement with the Periodical Press - Lesa Scholl31. Mary Smith (1822–89): A Radical Journalist under Many Guises - Florence Boos32. In Time of Disturbance: Political Dissonance and Subversion in Violet Fane’s Contributions to the Lady’s Realm - Ceylan Kosker33. ‘Our Women in Journalism’: African-American Women Journalists and the Circulation of News - Caroline Bressey34. The Late Victorian Feminist Press’ Response to Same-Sex Desire Controversies - Molly Youngkin35. Wings and the Woman’s Signal: Reputation and Respectability in Women’s Temperance Periodicals, 1892–9 - Gemma Outen