Anderton, Marja Arendina Louise (1994) The power to destroy false images: eight British women writers and society 1945-1968. PhD thesis http://theses.gla.ac.uk/4409/ Copyright and moral rights for this thesis are retained by the author A copy can be downloaded for personal non-commercial research or study, without prior permission or charge This thesis cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the Author The content must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the Author When referring to this work, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given Glasgow Theses Service http://theses.gla.ac.uk/ [email protected] THE POWER TO DESTROY FALSE IMAGES: Eight British Women Writers and Society 1945-1968 Marja Arendina Louise Anderton Thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of Sociology, University of Glasgow February 1994 @M.A.L. Anderton 1994 Acknowledgements As this thesis was written over several years and in a period of great change in my life, I feel that at this pOint I ought to express my gratitude to the people who encouraged me not to give up. First of all, of course, this is my supervisor, Barbara Littlewood, who very kindly helped me wherever she could in spite of the great distance between us for most of the time. Secondly, I would like to thank Iris Murdoch, Penelope Mortimer, A.S. Byatt, and Margaret Drabble for allowing me to use their correspondence here. On the personal level I would like to thank my mother and Nick, my husband, for providing me with financial back-up as well as with information relating to the period under discussion here. Last but not least I would like to thank Tommy and Edwin, my sons, for giving me such a useful insight into the trials and tribulations of motherhood .. , ii ~ 3 CD 3 -<0 0 -3 '< Q) -.-+ ::r CD ~., "0., 0 .,-Co en :::c Q)., -< .-+ -- .,CD :::c CD 0.: CD en 0 (') 55" en" .-+ Q) ~ .,Co CD Q) en .-+ I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree ... From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig a wonderful picture beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor, and another fig was Ee Gee, the amazing editor, and another fig was Europe and Africa and South America, and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and off-beat professions, and another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion, and beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn't make out. I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I could't make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and everyone of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest ... from: Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar (1963) Just before the war, women were supposed to be tall, broad-shouldered, slim-hipped, long­ legged. Martha's room may have been littered with books, but it was also plentifully supplied with magazines, where all the women conformed to that shape, and when she saw her reflection, when she imagined herself in this dress or that, she continually strained her mental image of herself upwards thinning it, posing it; when she saw herself ideally, crossing a room, under fire from admiring eyes, it was in the guise of this other, imposed woman ... This dress, however, had the power to destroy these false images ... She knew that the moment this dress clothed her body she would be revealed to herself, and to others, as something quite new, but deeply herself. That dress was made to clothe the person she knew herself to be '" from: Doris Lessing, Martha Quest (1952) iv Summary This dissertation aims to oppose the assumption underlying many studies that the imme­ diate post-war period was a "silent" time in which there were no signs that women were not generally content to follow the ideal of femininity, and that the feminist movement started suddenly in 1968. This thesis focuses on the dissenting voices which could be heard both in society and literature before 1968. Part I deals with the position of women in society between 1945 and 1968. It concentrates particularly on women at work and in the family. The fact that more married women than ever be­ fore entered the labour market after World War II contradicts the idea that British women in the '50s were mostly housewives. Furthermore, in spite of the apparent coming into existence of the so-called "affluent society", women had many reasons to feel dissatisfied. Women were mainly found in low-status and low-paid jobs, and in the family women had very little power, especially sexually and financially. This part of the thesis also deals with women in society who were ex­ pressing the discontent they felt. First of all, there were middle-class journalists (e.g. Stott) and SOCiologists (e.g. Gavron, Klein) who were registering women's dissatisfaction in their publica­ tions. Secondly, an outlet for grievances for women was formed by The Guardian's women's page (especially the letters section) which discussed many controversial issues. Part II deals with another group of middle-class women who turned to the problematic po­ sition of women in society in their publications, eight British women novelists who started writing in this period. This part discusses the lives of Doris Lessing, Iris Murdoch, Muriel Spark, Penelope Mortimer, A.S. Byatt, Margaret Drabble, Edna O'Brien and Beryl Bainbridge, with particular refe­ rence to their emergence as writers. The biographical section refers to interviews as well as to letters to the author. The final part of the dissertation discusses several novels by each writer. There are three main themes which recur again and again in these novels, the search for an identit)! (a female form of the Bildungsroman is very popular), the restrictive influence of the family on the heroines, and the importance of work for the self-esteem of many of the female characters. In these novels women do not have to choose between marriage and a career as in many earlier novels, but, like many of their female contemporaries in society, they are trying to combine both. v The writers discussed here thus had an avantgardist function - they touched on many issues the post-1968 feminist movement was to return to and was to put in a theoretical framework. vi CONTENTS Acknowledgements ii Summary v Introduction PART I BRITISH SOCIETY 1945-1968 18 CHAPTER I CHANGES IN BRITAIN 1945-1968 19 1.1 One Side of the Coin ... 21 1.2 Another Side of the Coin ... 30 CHAPTER II WOMEN AND WORK 1945-1968 34 II. 1 Married Women and Work 40 11.2 Occupational Distribution 51 11.3 Signs of Dissatisfaction 59 CHAPTER III WOMEN AND THE FAMILY 1945-1968 64 111.1 Woman as Wife 65 111.2 Woman as Mother 81 111.3 Women in the Extended Family 97 111.4 Signs of Dissatisfaction 98 CHAPTER IV FROM FEMININITY TO FEMINISM 101 IV.1 Expressions of Discontent, 1945-1968 101 IV.2 Dissatisfaction Reflected in the Media 106 IV.3 The Start of the Women's Movement 125 133 INTERLUDE vii PART II EIGHT WOMEN NOVELISTS 145 Introduction 146 CHAPTER I PORTRAITS OF THE WRITERS AS WOMEN 152 1.1 Muriel Spark 152 1.2 Penelope Mortimer 157 1.3 Iris Murdoch 163 1.4 Doris Lessing 166 1.5 Edna O'Brien 170 1.6 Beryl Bainbridge 174 1.7 A.S. Byatt 176 1.8 Margaret Drabble 178 CHAPTER II PORTRAITS OF THE WOMEN AS WRITERS 183 11.1 The Production Process 183 11.2 The Reception Process 208 CONCLUSIONS 233 PART III FEMALE FICTION 1945 - 1968 235 Introduction 236 CHAPTER I IN SEARCH OF AN IDENTITY 249 1.1 Female Bildungsromans 253 1.2 Female Novels of Formation 269 1.3 Conclusions 279 viii CHAPTER II THE FAMILY 280 II. 1 Wives 282 11.2 Parenthood 291 11.3 The Extended Family 297 11.4 Conclusions 303 CHAPTER III WORKING HEROINES 305 CONCLUSIONS 325 APPENDIX 332 REFERENCES 345 BIBLIOGRAPHY 374 ix INTRODUCTION The idea that art and reality are related in some way is certainly not a new one. Plato and Aristotle already philosophized about the exact nature of this relation. In The Republic Plato concluded, rather pessimistically, that literature is but the shadow of what really happens. To him the world itself is only an imperfect copy of some ideal existence beyond this world. Literature is thus two steps removed from the truth. Through the ages this concept of literature as mere imita- tion of reality developed into the theory that literature reflects reality or society in one way or another. In the twentieth-century this basic assumption underlies the thoughts of such diverse people as, for instance, D.H. Lawrence, Lionel Trilling and Roland Barthes. Hundreds of pages could be written explaining in detail the differences of opinion among them, but here a short summary of the most important lines of thought will have to suffice to provide an overview of twentieth-century ideas on the nature of the relation between fact and fiction, between society and literature. D.H.