Library Company of Philadelphia
Happy #Caturday! Today, we present this circa 1889 genre scene titled “What is Home Without a Husband?”, satirizing the “new woman” and the role reversal of men and women in the home. The scene shows the woman of the house, who has just entered the room from outside. Her husband sits on a stool doing housework near the fireplace. Their pet cat sits on the floor near his feet.
This Day in History!
On Wednesday, January 11, 1882, noted women’s rights advocate Kate Field (1838-1896) held a luncheon for Oscar Wilde when he was first in New York, at the beginning of his lecture tour on aestheticism. A couple of weeks later, this cartoon – characterizing the members of Field’s Co-operative Dress Association as “languishing maidens and sterile old girls” – appeared in an illustrated newspaper. Not only are Wilde and the women members of Field’s organization mocked, but the two women at the lower right in the cartoon may represent Kate Field and her partner Lilian Whiting (1847-1942). Field was a celebrity lecturer, who – like Oscar Wilde – provoked her own share of criticism.
Illustration in the Illustrated Police News (January 28, 1882). Gift of S. Marguerite Brenner.
We are continuing our #BackToSchool theme this #PublishersBindingThursday.
Marion Kirkland Reid, who published under the name Mrs. Hugo Reid, was a Scottish feminist writer best known for her 1843 book, A Plea for Woman, an argument for gender equality in opportunities for higher education, which was later published in the United States under the title Woman, Her Education and Influence.
The Library Company’s copy is bound in brown bookcloth with blind ornamental blocking and gilt stamped cover title.
Browse the Library Company’s database of 19th-Century Cloth Bindings to see more!