Abstract
In late eighteenth-century Europe , there was a rapid expansion in the publication of advice books directed at young adult women. Based on an examination of conduct books published in the Netherlands, this chapter traces the changing format of the genre from the last quarter of the eighteenth century through to the early decades of the twentieth century. It explores how women pedagogues in the nineteenth century developed new ways of advising young women that gave readers greater control over their life choices. In the early twentieth century, the emerging social sciences drew attention to the physical and emotional changes involved in female adolescence, prescribing for the young woman strict forms of behaviour.
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Notes
- 1.
Marja van Tilburg, Hoe hoorde het? Seksualiteit en partnerkeuze in de Nederlandse adviesliteratuur, 1780–1890 (Amsterdam: Het Spinhuis, 1998), 44–46, 83–95.
- 2.
Karen O’Brien, ‘Sexual distinctions and prescriptions’ in Sarah Knott and Barbara Taylor (eds), Women, Gender and Enlightenment (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), 3–7; Mary Catherine Moran, ‘Between the Savage and the Civil: Dr. John Gregory’s Natural History of Femininity,’ in ibid., 9–10.
- 3.
See for example Amanda Vickery, Behind Closed Doors: At Home in Georgian England (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2009); the phrase is borrowed from Christopher Lasch’s Haven in a Heartless World: The Family Besieged (New York: Basic Books, 1977).
- 4.
Van Tilburg, Hoe hoorde het?, 40–44, 46–52, 80–81.
- 5.
J. J. Rousseau, Œuvres complètes. Edited by Bernard Gagnebin and Marcel Raymond (Paris: Gallimard, 1969), iv, 502.
- 6.
Carol Dyhouse, Girls Growing Up in Late Victorian and Edwardian England (London: Routledge, 1981).
- 7.
Katherine Dalsimer, Female Adolescence: Psychoanalytic Reflections on Works of Literature (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1986).
- 8.
Sheila Rowbotham, Good Girls Make Good Wives: Guidance for Girls in Victorian Fiction (Oxford University Press, 1989).
- 9.
John Neubauer, The Fin-de-Siècle Culture of Adolescence (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992).
- 10.
Sarah Bilston, The Awkward Age in Women’s Popular Fiction, 1850–1900: Girls and the Transition to Womanhood (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2004).
- 11.
G. Stanley Hall, Adolescence: Its Psychology and its relations to Physiology, Anthropology, Sociology, Sex, Crime, Religion and Education (2 vols., London and New York: Appleton and Co., 1904).
- 12.
Nancy Lesko, Act Your Age!: A Cultural Construction of Adolescence (New York and London: Routledge Falmer, 2001).
- 13.
Compare Dena Goodman, Becoming a Woman in the Age of Letters (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2009), 63–67, 251–273.
- 14.
Young women could choose between conduct books for women, young adults, and young adult women. This variety is evidence of the flourishing of the genre of advice literature from the Enlightenment onwards. See Tilburg, Hoe hoorde het? for a full list of the publications analysed for this chapter.
- 15.
Nortbert Elias, Über den Prozess der Zivilisation: sociogenetische und psychogenetische Untersuchungen 2nd ed. (2 vols, Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1980).
- 16.
Mieke Bal and Christine van Boheemen, Narrotology: Introduction to the Theory of the Narrative, 3rd ed. (Toronto University Press, 2009).
- 17.
Anthony Pagden, The Enlightenment and Why It Still Matters (Oxford University Press, 2013), 5–7, 16–18.
- 18.
John Gregory, Het vaderlijk legaat zijn zijne dochters. Transl. from: A Father’s Legacy to his Daughters (Dordrecht: van Houtrijve en Bredius, 1841). A revised edition was published in Schoonhoven by S. E. van Nooten in 1848.
- 19.
J. H. Campe, Vaderlijke raad aan mijne dochter, in den smaak van Theohron. Aan de huuwbaare jufferschap gewijd. Transl. from: Väterlicher Rat für meine Tochter. Ein Gegenstück zum Theophron. Der erwachsenern weibliche Jugend gewidmet (Amsterdam: Wed. J. Doll, 1790).
- 20.
The notion habitus pertains to the combination of mentality and behavior. See Elias, Über den Prozess, I, vii–x, lxxi–lxxxii.
- 21.
This type of analogy reinforces the message embedded in the text. In many analyses of conduct books, the distinction between actual content and stylistic devices is not made. See Marja van Tilburg, ‘Pedagogy as the Third Partner in Marriage: Educating Young Adults Towards Partnership in the Netherlands, 1780–1890’ in Bruno W. F. Wanrooij (ed.), La Mediazione Matriomoniale: Il terzo (in)comodo in Europa fra Otto e Novecento. Biblioteca di Storia Sociale 32 (Fiesole and Rome: Georgetown University and Edizione di Storia e Letteratura, 2004), 175–182.
- 22.
G. C. de Greuve, Wilhelmina, of handboek voor het vrouwelijk geslacht. Maatschappij tot Nut van ’t Algemeen-Series XIII (Amsterdam: C. de Vries, H. van Munster en J. van der Hey, 1808), 109–124.
- 23.
Ibid., 114–115.
- 24.
Ibid., 114–116.
- 25.
Campe, Vaderlijke raad, 200.
- 26.
The genre of the marriage manual proliferated in the long nineteenth century: 67 different titles were published in the Netherlands. All discuss the choice of partner. See Tilburg, Hoe hoorde het?, 19–37.
- 27.
A. B. van Meerten-Schilperoort, Woorden van moederlijke liefde aan mijne dochter Mathilda. Adapted from: Worte mütterlicher Liebe an meine Tochter. Eine Gabe für Christliche Jungfrauen. Aus den Nachlasse der seelicher Freifrau Wilhelmina von Dehnhausen zu Grevenburg. geb. von Mengersen (Amsterdam: P.N. van Kampen, 1844); Mrs Ellis [S. Ellis-Stickney], The Women of England: Their Social Duties and Domestic Habits, 2nd ed. (Paris: Fisher, 1839).
- 28.
Ibid., 203.
- 29.
Ibid.
- 30.
Ellis, The Women of England, 29–30. Italics by Ellis.
- 31.
Meerten-Schilperoort, Woorden, 130.
- 32.
Phyllis Rose, A Woman of Letters: A Life of Virginia Woolf (London and Henley: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1978), 156–158.
- 33.
Neubauer, Fin-de-Siècle Culture, 82–86, 133–140, 157–159.
- 34.
Lesko, Act Your Age!, 51–54.
- 35.
See, for instance, Joseph F. Kett, Rites of Passage: Adolescence in America 1790 to the Present (New York: Basic Books, 1977); John Springhall, Coming of Age: Adolescence in Britain 1860–1960 (Dublin: Gill and Macmillan, 1986).
- 36.
Michel Foucault has demonstrated this trend in his various analyses of modern western culture. See, for example, his Histoire de la Sexualité (3 vols, Paris: Gallimard, 1976–1984).
- 37.
Mevrouw [Mrs.] J, De verloofde. Transl. from the German (Haarlem: Coebergh, 1896), 2–3.
- 38.
Lyman Beecher Sperry, Een boek voor jonge vrouwen. Transl. from: Confidential Talks with Young Women (Groningen: A.J. Vredevoogd, 1900), 15–16.
- 39.
See also Campe, Vaderlijk raad, 210 for an earlier discussion of masturbation.
Bibliography
Contemporary Printed Sources
Campe, J. H., Vaderlijke raad aan mijne dochter, in den smaak van Theohron. Aan de huuwbaare jufferschap gewijd [Fatherly Advice to my Daughter, in the Style of Theophron. Dedicated to Young Women Who have Reached the Age of Marriage]. Translated from: Väterlicher Rat für meine Tochter. Ein Gegenstück zum Theophron. Der erwachsenern weibliche Jugend gewidmet (Amsterdam: Wed. J. Doll, 1790)
Ellis, Mrs [Ellis-Stickney, S.], The Women of England. Their Social Duties and Domestic Habits. 2nd edition (Paris: Fisher, 1893)
Greuve, G. C. de., Wilhelmina, of handboek voor het vrouwelijk geslacht [Wilhelmina, or Guide for the Female Sex]. M. Ediaatschappij tot Nut van ’t Algemeen-Series XIII (Amsterdam: C. de Vries, H. van Munster en J. van der Hey, 1808)
Hall, Stanley, G., Adolescence: Its Psychology and its relations to Physiology, Anthropology, Sociology, Sex, Crime, Religion and Education (2 vols. London and New York: Appleton and Co., 1904)
Meerten-Schilperoort, A.B. van, Woorden van moederlijke liefde aan mijne dochter Mathilda [Words of Motherly Love to My Daughter Mathilda]. Adapted from: Worte mütterlicher Liebe an meine Tochter. Eine Gabe für Christliche Jungfrauen. Aus den Nachlasse der seelicher Freifrau Wilhelmina von Dehnhausen zu Grevenburg. geb. von Mengersen (Amsterdam: P.N. van Kampen, 1844)
Mevrouw [Mrs.] J., De verloofde [The Fiancée]. Translated from the German. (Haarlem: Coebergh, 1896)
Rousseau, Jean-Jacques, Œuvres complètes, vol. iv, Émile, ou l’éducation. Edited by Bernard Gagnebin and Marcel Raymond (Paris: Gallimard, 1969)
Sperry, Lyman Beecher, Een boek voor jonge vrouwen [A Book for Young Women]. Translated from: Confidential Talks with Young Women (Groningen: A.J. Vredevoogd, 1900)
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Dyhouse, Carol, Girls Growing Up in Late Victorian and Edwardian England (London: Routledge, 1981)
Elias, Norbert, Über den Prozess der Zivilisation: Soziogenetische und psychogenetische Untersuchungen [On the Process of Civilisation: Sociogenetic and Psychogenetic Investigations] 2nd edition. (2 vols, Frankfurt am.Main: Suhrkamp, 1980)
Foucault, Michel, Histoire de la Sexualité [History of sexuality] (3 vols, Paris: Gallimard, 1976–1984)
Goodman, Dena, Becoming a Woman in the Age of Letters (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2009)
Kett, Joseph. F., Rites of Passage: Adolescence in America 1790 to the Present (New York: Basic Books, 1977)
Lasch, Christopher, Haven in a Heartless World: The Family Besieged (New York: Basic Books, 1977)
Lesko, Nancy, Act Your Age!: A Cultural Construction of Adolescence (New York and London: Routledge Falmer, 2001)
Moran, Mary Catherine, ‘Between the Savage and the Civil: Dr. John Gregory’s Natural History of Femininity’ in Sarah Knott and Barbara Taylor (eds), Women, Gender and Enlightenment (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), 8–29
Neubauer, John, The Fin-de-Siècle Culture of Adolescence (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1992)
O’Brien, Karen, ‘Sexual Distinctions and Prescriptions’ in Sarah Knott and Barbara Taylor (eds), Women, Gender and Enlightenment (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), 3–7
Pagden, Anthony, The Enlightenment and Why It Still Matters (Oxford University Press, 2013)
Rose, Phyllis, A Woman of Letters: A Life of Virginia Woolf (London and Henley: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1978)
Rowbotham, Sheila, Good Girls Make Good Wives: Guidance for Girls in Victorian Fiction (Oxford University Press, 1989)
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Van Tilburg, Marja, Hoe hoorde het?: Seksualiteit en partnerkeuze in de Nederlandse adviesliteratuur 1780–1890 [How to Behave? Sexuality and Choice of Partner in the Dutch Advice Literature 1780–1890] (Amsterdam: Het Spinhuis, 1998)
Van Tilburg, Marja, ‘Pedagogy as the Third Partner in Marriage. Educating Young Adults Towards Partnership in the Netherlands, 1780–1890’ in Bruno W. F. Wanrooij (ed.), La Mediazione Matriomoniale: Il terzo (in)comodo in Europa fra Otto e Novecento. Biblioteca di Storia Sociale 32 (Fiesole and Rome: Georgetown University and Edizione di Storia e Letteratura, 2004), 155–193
Vickery, Amanda, Behind Closed Doors: At Home in Georgian England (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2009)
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van Tilburg, M. (2018). From ‘Young Women’ to ‘Female Adolescents’: Dutch Advice Literature during the Long Nineteenth Century. In: O'Dowd, M., Purvis, J. (eds) A History of the Girl. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69278-4_3
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