Letters Written in Sweden, Norway and Denmark by Mary Wollstonecraft

The book in October for the reading group was Mary Wollstonecraft’s Letters Written during a Short Residence in Sweden, Norway and Denmark, first published in 1796. It was Wollstonecraft’s last book published during her lifetime and the most popular. The book consists of twenty-five letters written whilst Wollstonecraft travelled round Scandinavia with her baby daughter Fanny.

The letters are primarily a travelogue of the countries Wollstonecraft visits, describing the countries, the people and the beautiful landscapes. She also comments on the political problems, she witnessed. In Norway, in letter thirteen she describes how peasants are recruited into the army, and how unfair the system is that they are not allowed to choose whether they go into service at sea of for the army: ‘And what appears more tyrannical, the inhabitants of certain districts are appointed for the land, others for the sea service.’ Compared with her other travels in France and England, the old aristocracy in Norway and Sweden seemed harsher to her. For instance she saw how criminals are enslaved in Norway, and how the people of Christiana rose to protest the cost of grain: ‘They threw stones at Mr. Anker, the owner of it, as he rode out of town to escape their fury.’

However one of the main themes throughout the book is Wollstonecraft’s questioning of commerce in the countries, and she does not hide her dislike of it. She discusses the war economy that has developed in Scandinavia, creating an unjust taxation on the people involved in the conflict. Her conclusion results in poor commerce, as well as allowing more merchants to take advantage, of more people. She believes that commerce: ‘wears out the most sacred principle of humanity and rectitude.’ She compares the systems in Norway and Sweden to those in England and France, believing that commerce helped with revolution but the people there should be careful of relying to heavily on the system, otherwise it will turn back to the old ways of governing. And by the end of her travels she is particularly scathing: ‘men, indeed seem of the species of the fungus; and the insolent vulgarity which a sudden influx of wealth usually produces in common minds.’

The book is very emotional one, as well as political. Wollstonecraft initially took the trip for her lover Gilbert Imlay, to retrieve a stolen treasure ship for him (although this is never mentioned directly in the book itself) in hope that this would mend their fading relationship. Her feelings over Imlay are reflected in many of the letters, particularly towards the end of the book, when she perceives that Imlay is no longer committed to the relationship or their daughter. The letters do not mention Imlay specifically as they are all written in the first person, but whilst discussing her ideas on commerce, it can be seen that she attacking a specific person: ‘Ah! I shall whisper to you –that you—yourself are strangely altered since you have entered deeply into commerce.’ This is from letter twenty-three when she is in Hamburg, where Imlay was supposed to meet her but failed to, so her emotional state had worsened and this can be easily felt through her writing. A result of this is she leaves for London earlier than expected and so ends the book, giving it a slightly rushed and unfinished feeling to it, reflecting the author’s troubled emotional state.

Morwenna Roche

Fashion and dress in the collection

Fashion as we know it - a series of rapidly mutating trends in the style of the dress - began in the eighteenth century. The way a person dresses, the clothing they select, sends out a set of social signals that communicate class and status. It is also the most personal form of self-expression and the choice of what both covers and decorates the body leads us to form conclusions, conscious or unconscious, about each other.

Jane Austen’s letters reveal her interest in being fashionable: ‘My black cap was openly admired by Mrs. Lefroy, and secretly I imagine by everyone else in the room’ (Steventon to Godmersham, 1798). Her niece, Fanny Knight, owned copies of La Belle Assemblee, like those on display here, and periodicals such as these, or Ackerman’s Repository and the Lady’s Magazine contained engravings of the latest styles. Newspapers also offered information on current fashions. This commodification of dress for the leisured classes gave employment to writers and illustrators, just as today fashion magazines thrive on the twice-yearly output of the fashion industry.

News of fashion spread by word of mouth and by letter remained important, especially for those without access to periodicals. Austen demonstrates this in an 1814 letter to Martha Lloyd: ‘I am amused by the present style of female dress; the coloured petticoats with braces over the white Spencers and enormous Bonnets upon the full stretch, are quite entertaining. It seems to me a more marked change than one had lately seen.’

Dress in the late eighteenth century and early nineteenth century, as displayed here, was an indicator of a person’s wealth and status and considerable expense was necessary to maintain a fashionable lifestyle. Fashion demanded followers from all classes and again Austen was a participant, if not victim, in the need to consume the latest trends. She wrote from London in 1811: ‘I am getting very extravagant & spending all my Money …’ and she lists two different muslins and Wedgwood as items on her shopping list. Remaining fashionable required more than lengths of fabric: there were also ribbons and other trimmings, sewing and embroidery threads, buttons and, maybe, a dressmaker. Then there were shawls, cloaks and hats, bonnets and caps, veils, headdresses, shoes and gloves, not forgetting, fans, bags, reticules, jewelry, and underneath it all underwear and stockings.

In Austen’s Persuasion Sir Walter Elliot is ridiculed for his vanity and obsession with fashion. He examines himself in the mirror, feels that Lady Russell could do with the help of some makeup and recommends Gowland’s Lotion for improving complexions. A real product of the period, Gowland’s Lotion was advertised in 1814 as a solution to face and skin problems just as facial skincare is sold today. For those that could afford more than a sliver of soap toilet waters were a fashionable part of personal hygiene and in 1822 George IV’s perfume bill was £263. It is still possible to buy some of the fragrances made around this time, which were eau de colognes and single flower waters, especially lavender, rose and orange flower.

In A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792) by Mary Wollstonecraft, Austen’s contemporary, an interest in fashion as a form of 'slavery': 'The air of fashion which many young people are so eager to attain, always strikes me like the studied attitudes of some modern prints, copied with tasteless servility after the antique; the soul is left out, and none of the parts are tied together by what may properly be termed character.' Wollstonecraft dressed with apparent carelessness which signalled her seriousness as a philosopher, just as in the twentieth century Katherine Hepburn wore old clothes, safety-pinned, to show she had not been seduced by Hollywood's glamour.

Mary Wollstonecraft - 250 years on

The BBC are celebrating the 250th anniversary of the birth of Mary Wollstonecraft with a series of three letters addressed to her http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00k9d8q. The first is by Janet Todd on Wollstonecraft's treatise Thoughts on the Education of Daughters and there are 3 days left to listen to it on BBC i-player. The second will be Richard Reeves updating Wollstonecraft on her ideas about republicanism. The BBC link will take you to the information page with the episode and schedule details.

Reading Group schedule 2009 - 2010

The reading group has continued busily since September 2008 reading a range of books including The Grasmere and Alfoxden Journals by Dorothy Wordsworth and The Wanderer by Frances Burney. As a slight departure, the final book of the 2009-2010 season will be Elizabeth’s Gaskell’s Ruth because 2010 is the bicentennial anniversary of Elizabeth Gaskell’s birth and she had local connections, owning a house, The Lawns, in Holybourne, Alton.

18 May 2009 The Last Man by Mary Shelley

Summer break from June 2009 – August 2009

21 September 2009 A Simple Story (1791) by Elizabeth Inchbald

19 October 2009 Letters written in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark (1796) by Mary Wollstonecraft

16 November 2009 Millenium Hall (1762) by Sarah Scott

21 December 2009 The Sylph (1779) by Georgiana Cavendish Devonshire

18 January 2010 The History of Mary Prince: a West Indian Slave (1831) by Mary Prince

15 February 2010 Oroonoko: or the history of the royal slave (1688) by Aphra Behn

15 March 2010 Coelebs in search of a wife: comprehending observations on domestic habits and manners, religion and morals (1809) by Hannah More

19 April 2010 The Wonder (1714) by Susannah Centlivre

17 May 2010 Ruth (1853) by Elizabeth Gaskell.

For more information please contact the Library on 01420 541010 or info@chawton.net