Women's Work

CHAPTER I.. _women’s Work: Literary, Professional, and Artistic._

WOMEN’S WORK: LITERARY, PROFESSIONAL, AND ARTISTIC.

General characteristics--Classification--LITERATURE: Fiction--Journalism--TEACHING: Recent changes--Day v. Resident Posts--High Schools--Advantages and Disadvantages--Hours and Salaries--Report of Committee of Enquiry--Fees--Elementary Schools--Table of Salaries--London School Board--Voluntary v. Secondary Schools--Domestic Economy--Demand for teachers--New openings--Higher teaching posts--RELIGION and PHILANTHROPY: Increased employment of women--Women preachers--LAW: Present position of affairs--Conveyancing--MEDICINE: Progress made--Prospects--Recent appointments--India--Pharmacy--Dentistry--Midwifery--NURSING: Inadequate arrangements--Remuneration--ART: Music, Painting, Sculpture--Obstacles to progress--Remuneration--THE STAGE: Prospects--The Ballet and its remuneration--HANDICRAFTS: Artistic crafts--Pottery--Jewellery--Lithography--Engraving--GENERAL CONCLUSIONS: Social hindrances.

In dealing with the more cultured branches of women’s work we have to do with a department which, except in one or two directions, is as yet incomplete, being still in process of growth and development. Women are but slowly working their way into the arts and the learned professions, and their place cannot yet be definitely estimated. Progress has been so rapid of late that what is true one year has ceased to hold good in the next. A writer who attempts to deal with matter that is thus in a state of flux can only hope to give a tolerably faithful picture of the moment, acknowledging frankly that present conditions may soon give place to something very different. A counterbalancing advantage, however, lies in the fact that in literary and professional work women are independent units, and their labour is not, as in manufacture and manual occupations, so mixed up with that of men that it is almost impossible to treat of it apart. In the occupations with which this chapter is concerned each woman as a rule is economically independent of other workers, and is free to make her individual talent and idiosyncrasy fully felt. There is a satisfaction in noting what women are able to do when their hands are free, though a careful examination of the conditions under which their work is carried on may lead to the conclusion that circumstances are not yet as favourable to the production of good work as they will eventually become. It should be premised that work of any kind, literary or other, is here regarded from a purely industrial point of view, and that the aim of the writer is not to criticise, but simply to record.

For practical purposes the occupations here treated of may be classified thus:

(1) Literary work, including journalism.

(2) Teaching.

(3) Other professional work, including medicine and nursing.

(4) Art, including such handicrafts as are practised by women; music, and the drama.

Various occupations not coming precisely under any of these heads are followed by a few scattered individuals, but these will receive merely a passing notice. They are interesting in themselves, but are so largely experimental that it would be useless to consider them at any length, since they may disappear at any moment.

=Literature.=--It is only recently that women have entered the field of literature in any numbers. Until the last thirty years or so it may almost be said that only a few exceptional women, able to make their mark as poets or novelists, were occupied to any serious extent in literary work. Nor when we remember that the pursuit of literature was considered to “unsex” a woman, and that Mrs. Somerville had to keep a supply of plain sewing ready to cover her books and papers if a visitor should call, is the deficiency very difficult to account for. Only natures in which genius is a compelling force can burst such iron bonds. Fanny Burney, Jane Austen, Miss Mitford, Mrs. Somerville, Charlotte Bronté, and Mrs. Browning--to name a few of the pioneers--first broke down the barriers. Then other quiet workers crept in, magazines became more numerous, and offered a ready outlet for literary work; biography, history, and science began to be handled by women. Harriet Martineau perhaps more than any other woman typified the modern phase of literary activity, fulfilling in her single person functions any one of which would content most literary women, being novelist, essay writer, historian, and journalist in one. She was the first of her sex to enter upon the routine every-day work of literature, which has been freely trodden since, and her writings embody much of the tone of thought and feeling which is characteristic of the “women’s movement” of to-day.

=Fiction.=--The branch of literature in which women are most successful at present is undoubtedly fiction. Besides the few novelists whose names are widely known, there are a multitude of scribblers of lesser fame who yet make a good living by their profession. There are grades in these things, and writers whose works are seldom found on the shelves of the fastidious are yet in good demand at the libraries, and have a circulation and a public of their own. An immense amount of second class fiction is written by women, who seem to have a special gift for producing tales that are readable and brightly written without ever rising above the level of mediocrity. There is a still lower literary grade, in which poverty of invention keeps company with a wretched literary style. Yet books of this class are not always unsuccessful.

The writing of fiction is usually supposed to be a highly remunerative occupation, and so indeed it often is. But it does not follow that the writing of three volume novels pays. The phenomenal success, pecuniary and literary, of one or two recent novels must not be taken as a sample of what a writer may expect. Though a good price is generally paid for a novel if the author has once hit the public taste, only moderate terms can be secured by less known writers, and beginners must be content to part with their works for a very small sum. A well-known novelist may receive £400, £500, or even more for a novel, but a writer of fair reputation does not as a rule receive more than £100 for a novel that may have taken many months to write. If the novelist is wise, however, she will make a varied use of her material. Good prices, say from £100 to £250, are given for serial stories by publishing syndicates, who issue the tale simultaneously in half-a-dozen newspapers; and the regular publishers do not as a rule give any less for novels which have already appeared in the serial form. Probably they regard the earlier issue as a good advertisement. Short tales also pay well to those who can write them, and by the contribution of occasional miscellaneous papers to magazines and reviews the strain of prolonged composition may be avoided and the income proportionately improved. A lady novelist and miscellaneous writer in London has been making from £600 to £700 a year for some time, and has lately made as much as £900. Just at present the acknowledged author has an advantage even in journalism, for there is a great demand for articles in newspapers signed by writers of repute. As much as £10 a column is sometimes received for articles not in themselves of an important character by writers whose names are well known in other fields. It is an expensive fancy, and whether it will last cannot yet be predicted; but if one paper indulges in it, the rest are obliged to follow suit. Outside fiction, a good deal of miscellaneous literary work is done by women, of which it is impossible to give any detailed account. Each writer works in her own fashion, and for lack of meeting-places there has hitherto been little interchange of thought or experience among literary women. The foundation of the Writers’ Club in London may perhaps be taken as a sign of change in these matters. The formation of this institution is instructive, since it was due to the limitation of the projected “Authors’ Club” to men, on the express ground (endorsed by Mr. Walter Besant) that women writers could not afford to pay the subscription. In support of this opinion a lady engaged in literary work in London estimates that few of the rank and file among her colleagues are earning more than £200 a year. On the other hand, some writers have made a competency for old age, and not a few married women, hard pressed by fate, have contrived to bring up a family upon their literary earnings. Miss Annie S. Swan recently owned to an income of about £1,000 a year, and Miss Yonge made a handsome fortune by her novels. Successful playwrights also make a good deal of money; but it is doubtful whether any woman comes under this category as yet.

George Eliot received £8,000 for Middlemarch, but Mrs. Humphry Ward is said to have received £18,000 for David Grieve.

=Journalism.=--At the present moment journalism appears to be the fashionable literary pursuit for women, and their contributions to the daily and weekly papers have increased enormously during the last few years. The general lightening of the cargo which has taken place throughout the periodical press has greatly contributed to this result; for women writers have usually a light touch, and an apparently inexhaustible power of turning out bright and readable, though often flimsy, articles upon social subjects. In the department of dress they of course reign supreme, and few newspapers can now afford to despise this erstwhile frivolous subject. The writers who discourse upon fashion, however, have, as a rule, had little literary training; and through their efforts a kind of press jargon has been evolved, wonderful alike in grammar, in phraseology, in similes. But this is the least creditable form of feminine journalism, and we will not linger over it. In many of the papers written for women (and to which, of course, women largely contribute) there is very fair writing upon a great variety of subjects. Women have occasionally been successful in the main walks of journalism, but the position of the lady who represents the Daily News in Paris is probably unique. As a rule women keep to their special department, chronicling the doings of London society, and taking charge of the lighter topics generally, while their confrères are dealing with politics and diplomacy. This new development of journalism affords an example of the results which may be expected to follow when women are allowed free play to their activities in other directions. They will not always simply duplicate the work of their male predecessors, but will enlarge the field of operations by striking out a line of their own.

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