Victorian London's Middle-Class Housewife: What She Did All Day

by Yaffa Claire Draznin

Through a detailed description of the life and activities of the middle-class married woman of London between 1875 and 1900, this study reveals how housewives unwittingly became engines for change as the new century neared. In marked contrast to the stereotypical depictions of Victorian women in literature and on television, Draznin reveals a woman seldom the stay-at-home housewife whose activities were not much different than those of her counterparts today. By exploring her daily activities, how she cleaned her home, disciplined her children, managed her servants, stretched a limited budget, and began to indulge herself, one discovers the human dimension of women who lived more than a century ago. While most studies of this period consider values, aspirations, and attitudes, this book concentrates on actions, what these women did all day, to provide readers with a new perspective on Victorian life.

Late-Victorian London was a surprisingly modern city with a public face of well-lit streets, an excellent underground railway system, and extended municipal services. In the home, gas stoves were replacing coal ranges and household appliances were becoming more common. Having both money to spend and a strong incentive to buy the new laborsaving devices, ready-to-wear clothing, and other manufactured products, the middle-class matron's resistance to change gave way to a rising consumer culture. Despite her nearly exclusive preoccupation with home and family, these urban women became agents for the modernization of Britain.

Genres: Nonfiction, London, History, British Literature

256 pages, Hardcover

First published November 30, 2000

Reviews

[Tamara]

Does just what it says on the tin. Good material overview. Interesting how some desperately obvious things (Handling of money by women, for example) remain kind of mysterious because they must have been so obviously and unintrusively part of the every-day that no one actually bothered to ever write about them much. The transition into recognizable modernity is also sort of neat to observe, paralleling processes that would go on taking place around the world for decades yet (and still are, in a few places.) The book is rather too brief to make a strong case for middle class woman driving domestic progress, but it does seem like an intuitive conclusion.

[JL Salty]

Rating: pg for informative discussion of 1800s birth control and child birth.
Recommend: project / research hs and up

3 pages of Victorian sexual knowledge.

[Juliet · Rating 2 out of 5]

Really only 2 chapters answer "what she did all day." The rest of the book is more of a picture of what were her surroundings, or what was the medical/doctor situation like at the time, or what was the thinking on breast feeding at the time. The book seems to be based almost entirely on secondary material, mainly the omnipresent Mrs. Beeton's. It would have been nice if Draznin could have brought some new, primary source material to the discussion, or to offer some perspective other than quick summaries what was in the magazines or what counted as self-help books of the day. Draznin also tends to say far too often, "We cannot generalize about the middle class housewife," when that's the very purpose of the book. And then she goes & does it anyway. She also says all too often, "We don't really know" details about such & such a topic. Disappointing.

There are some useful facts & tidbits tucked in the chapters, though lots of things are skimmed over very quickly. So this is a good quick introduction to the superficials of the Victorian Middle-Class woman's life, but don't expect it to get into the nitty gritty or lots of detail and investigation.

[Megan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting but super condensed. If you're new to Victorian history specifically that of the feminine this is a fine starter. If you're entrenched in this stuff then this book is a quick read and decent summation of the culture of middle class Victorian women.