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#notafeministbook or is it?
Having been shucked up in bed the last couple of days coughing and spluttering, in between sleeping I have spent my time reading this beauty by Henry James: ‘The Bostonians.’ I turned to this book because a) I am already a huge fan of James and b) because I understood the novel to be set amongst the fight for female suffrage in the US. With International Women’s Day coming up I thought it would be the perfect read, however, I was left pretty angry by the final pages.
The novel tells the story of a battle between two cousins, Olive Chancellor (a Bostonian and female rights activist) and Basil Ransom (a Mississippian, ex-Confederate and misogynist) over the possession of Verena Tarrant. Verena is a talented orator who uses her gift to give speeches on the female struggle.
My main problem with the novel arose around 80 pages towards the end, where we see an internal battle within Verena. Her love for Ransom makes her question her beliefs, her independence, and the position of women in general. She is willing to give up all of her opportunities to be the poor wife of a man who doesn’t want her to have a voice. The turn of the narrative made me so angry I almost decided not to finish the book.
However, the story redeems itself in the last lines, the final moment: ‘But though she was glad, he presently discovered that, beneath her hood, she was in tears. It is to be feared that with the union, so far from brilliant, into which she was about the enter, these were not the last she was destined to shed.’ It left me with the question, ‘is this a feminist novel, or not?’
Having been shucked up in bed the last couple of days coughing and spluttering, in between sleeping I have spent my time reading this beauty by Henry James: ‘The Bostonians.’ I turned to this book because a) I am already a huge fan of James and b) because I understood the novel to be set amongst the fight for female suffrage in the US. With International Women’s Day coming up I thought it would be the perfect read, however, I was left pretty angry by the final pages.
The novel tells the story of a battle between two cousins, Olive Chancellor (a Bostonian and female rights activist) and Basil Ransom (a Mississippian, ex-Confederate and misogynist) over the possession of Verena Tarrant. Verena is a talented orator who uses her gift to give speeches on the female struggle.
My main problem with the novel arose around 80 pages towards the end, where we see an internal battle within Verena. Her love for Ransom makes her question her beliefs, her independence, and the position of women in general. She is willing to give up all of her opportunities to be the poor wife of a man who doesn’t want her to have a voice. The turn of the narrative made me so angry I almost decided not to finish the book.
However, the story redeems itself in the last lines, the final moment: ‘But though she was glad, he presently discovered that, beneath her hood, she was in tears. It is to be feared that with the union, so far from brilliant, into which she was about the enter, these were not the last she was destined to shed.’ It left me with the question, ‘is this a feminist novel, or not?’
