A good book: "Bachelor Girl" by Betsy Israel

[StellaBlue]

It's about the historical evolution of the old maid, spinster, and hip singleton, from the 17th century to SATC, with most focus on the 20th century.

Did you know, for instance, that there was a group of women in the 19th century, including Susan B Anthony and Florence Nightingale, who were intentional spinsters, calling themselves "singly blessed".

[Warpy]

1. There have always been intentional spinsters

Some went into service, becoming maids if they were poor and governesses if they'd been well off enough to be educated. Convents absorbed a lot of intentional spinsters, with the wealthier getting rather nice apartments within their walls and escaping much of the self mortification required of poorer sisters. A few were the embarrassing old maid aunt, used as a servant by the family which supported her. The Industrial Revolution offered them a much better way out of servitude, 16 hour workdays and all.

Some women became intentional singles with widowhood, but only if they'd been left with the means to do so. Many males left estates to children, bypassing wives. A woman could manage the estate only until the first male heir came into his majority, and then she was stuck, either becoming a servant in her own home or adopting one of the strategies listed above.

We singles have always been out there, no matter how rigidly our lives have been defined as brood mares.

[StellaBlue]

2. Yup, yup

I am definited a blessed singleton.

:hi:

[Samurai_Writer]

3. A lot of 'spinsters' in the earlier days were lesbians, too

They would be 'roommates' or 'housemates' with another spinster lady. A great example of this in a movie is If These Walls Could Talk 2, the first story with Vanessa Redgrave. It's a story of two older lesbians in the 50s, and what happens when Vanessa's lover dies.

[StellaBlue]

4. That's true, of course

But I am really interested in straight women who CHOOSE not to marry

The book is mostly about these women, but also about how all unmarried women (including lesbians, because, for the scope of history the book is concerned with, they were unmarried in the conventional sense) were (are) perceived as a threat to "society".

It's very interesting.

So I do feel a little but of comradeship with my not-married-to-men lesbian sisters! :)

[raccoon]

5. I'll look into that book. nt

[PassingFair]

6. I like the alliances.

Elizabeth Cady-Stanton and Susan B. Anthony.

Two great minds. One "afflicted" with children and a husband.
The other free to spread the word.

A GREAT collaboration.


http://adh.sc.edu/sa/sa-table.html