Housewives through History

Since I first started thinking about becoming a housewife and what that meant, I began to reflect back on where housewives came from in the UK. I turned  to my friendly Google to find out more. I've come across lots of different articles and books which have given me pause for thought - but most recently I've come across a book called 'Wives and Housewives - a story for our times'.

The book was written and published in Victorian times by a women called Miss Mary Hooper. Miss Hooper began by writing articles on cooking for a magazine before moving on to writing her own books such as Little Dinners and Handbook for the Breakfast Table . She became a Professor of Domestic Sciences at the Crystal Palace School of Arts, Science and Literature. She also wrote about how housewives could run their households, most notably in 'Wives and Housewives - a story for our times'.  Luckily the text of the book is available for free online at this link.

Wives and Housewives is a novel with a moral message.

Spoiler Alert - click below if you want to read a plot synopsis. If you don't you'll have to read something else. 




The book centres around the differing fortunes of one extended family, with a particular focus on female cousins Lily and Janet. At the start of the book Janet is just about to marry and Lily is being courted.

As a wife Janet runs her home with economy, morality and simplicity at it's heart. She works hard from six in the morning till her husband comes home and then puts aside her own hobbies and enjoyments to join him in his. Her attitude is the work of her mother who has educated her to be the 'perfect' housewife and taught her that serving and pleasing her husband is all that matters. Her skill and economy mean that her house is kept clean to high standards all her meals are perfect and her servants well behaved. She also saves money.

Lily visits Janet before her own marriage. She is led to believe by her own mother that Janet has thrown herself away on a man with a low income who can only afford to keep one servant. You see, Lily's mother thinks of nothing but social climbing and appearances  and has near bankrupted Lily's father in order to make her daughters seem richer then they are, so much so that Lily has no dowry.

When Lily visits Janet she is rather condescendingly expecting to find Janet unhappy. During the visit she acknowledges that Janet's good housekeeping and general attitude has meant that her and her husband live well but she feels that she could never live her life in the same way and that Janet is a drudge. Her doting fiancé Arthur is aware of her attitude but closes his eyes to it, believing that his love for her, and his income (which is higher then Janet's husband's income) will suffice to keep Lily in the luxury to which she is accustomed.

Lily and Arthur marry and then lots of completely predictable things happen. Janet and her husband go from strength to strength, while Lily and Arthur experience the completely opposite fortunes. Lily is a bad wife, she manages the house badly, spends too much, doesn't care that her servants are abusing her larder and her possessions and neglects her husband. You see, Lily likes having a social life too much and is always gadding about going places instead of humbly waiting by the fireside for her man.

Naturally Lily and Arthur argue a lot, but Arthur always gives in to her demand for more money. Because she goes out so much Lily becomes ill and it is suggested, rather coldly, that this causes a miscarriage. Lily and Arthur's marriage and financial situation deteriorates further over the months during the course of which Lily's father kills himself because he is about to be made bankrupt because of the financial demands of Lily's mother.

Lily then has a baby but for some reason dies because she insists on getting dressed and going downstairs. The baby also dies because Lily wouldn't breast feed it because then she couldn't go out to parties.

Poor Arthur is left heartbroken and financially broken but luckily a nosey spinster from next door leaves him a fortune in her will because she feels guilty she didn't go around to the house to tell him his wife is useless.

He mopes around Europe for a while but then returns to England to visit Janet, who he believes is the icon of all wifely virtue. At her house he falls in love with Janet's assistant who is also her cousin and a mini Janet. So it all ends happily for that branch of the family. Lily's mother and sisters however end up living by the seaside and die alone.

So far so average. There is nothing particularly shocking in this novel, the themes of it have been written about time and time again. A housewife is a valuable thing, an asset to the husband who is the centre of her universe. She is economical, graceful, wise and patient and thinks only of the welfare of the family. Her house and servants are all calm and beautiful and people look to her as a pillar of the community. A mere wife in contrast is a drain on her husband. She thinks only of parties and dresses, depletes his fortune and ignores his emotional and spiritual needs. They are polar opposites. Janet is presented to us as everything good about womenhood, while Lily represents everything bad. Even their furniture is different. Janet's is attractive but simple and practical, whereas Lily's is fashionable but flimsy and soon shows wear and tear or brakes. Janet's reward is the praise and love of everyone around her, Lily's is an early death.

It's exactly the kind of moralising you'd expect from a Victorian novel and you'd be forgiven for thinking that the novel is an accurate representation of Victorian values. However at the bottom of the online version there is a review of the book which was published in 1875 in the New York Times. It cuts contemporary women a remarkable amount of slack and criticises the book and other 'social reformers' as it describes Mary Hooper and her ilk, of asking too much of women. The review notes that women are expected to combine "all the housewifely talents of our great grandmothers with the intellectual advancement which comes of Cambridge Examinations" 


The article goes on to discuss this genre of book and notes that the women in them achieve miracles, reforming sinners, making houses beautiful with few resources all the while looking well dressed. It then mocks Wives and Housewives at length, referring at one point to Janet's behaviour and the fact that "in the evenings she waits for her husband with open arms. We hope that he does not often miss his train so as to keep her longer then is absolutely necessary in that fatiguing position". I actual snorted out loud at that one, at a joke more then 130 years old.

The really striking thing about the article is that it feels so familiar even though it is so old. In 1875 parts of the world were setting unrealistic and unhelpful standards for women to live up to, and yet parts of the media were picking this attitude apart and noting it's hypocrisies.

What it also showed is that the expectations for housewives were not clear cut and nor was the role and it's responsibilities at all clearly defined or universally agreed upon.