'On mentioning the unmentionable' : feminism, little magazines, and the case of Rebecca West
Abstract
Recent projects conducted by The Universities of De Montfort, Nottingham, and
Sussex, U.K. and Brown University in Providence, U.S.A., have highlighted the
wealth of under-researched material contained in early twentieth-century little
magazines. These niche periodicals, in a cultural materialist sense, provide a useful
entry point for the research, analysis, and recreation of the zeitgeist of what can be
loosely termed ‘the Modernist movement.’ One area in which these magazines are
particularly useful is in uncovering the genesis of modern or contemporary feminist
thought. In some respects it can be argued that despite their small circulation figures
and limited readership, magazines such as The Freewoman, The New Freewoman, and
BLAST reveal a groundbreaking shift in, and towards the ‘Woman Question’. Women
editors and writers such as Dora Marsden and Rebecca West, embraced new
continental philosophies and aesthetics, and used them to deconstruct the concept of
‘Woman.’ Grasping the idea of individualism, Marsden challenged the essentialist
language that controlled women through oppressive gender stereotypes.
This thesis will map out the feminist topography that influenced and
encouraged Dora Marsden in her quest for a more wholesale, psychological, female
emancipation, as opposed to continuing the singular pursuit of the franchise. Through
The Freewoman journals Marsden, and her protégée West, began to articulate new
modes of feminism that challenged the grand narratives of Edwardian society and
exposed the cultural and linguistic fault lines that created ‘woman’ as ‘the helpmeet’;
a subordinate and commodified adjunct to man. Far from being outmoded or
forgotten, Marsden’s ideas – particularly those concerned with language – have
filtered their way into modern consciousness through feminist writers such as West,
and at times prove prescient of the groundbreaking work of Simone de Beauvoir,
Monique Wittig, Judith Butler, and Julia Kristeva. Complementing the stimulating
research of Lucy Bland, Peter Brooker, Cary Franklin, Sandra Gilbert, Susan Gubar,
Gillian Hanscombe, Sheila Jeffreys, Jane E. Marek, Maroula Joannou, Janet Lyons,
Jean-Michele Rabaté, Robert Scholes, Andrew Thacker, Virginia L. Smyers, and
Clifford Wulfman, this thesis will examine how Freewoman individualism helped
shape the early fiction of Rebecca West and influenced the masculinist ethos of its
contemporary little magazine, BLAST.
Type
Thesis, PhD Doctor of Philosophy
Rights
Embargo Date: 2024-05-19
Embargo Reason: Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Print and electronic copy restricted until 19th May 2024
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