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  • Welcome to the Victorian book of morality and etiquette...

    Which I happen to have found kicking around a book store. Some of its comments are priceless...

    'No woman on the stage will ever make a respectable wife.Although most easily observed,she has shown every part of herself to a paying audience.Distrust a woman who will show her legs on the stage'
    'Heavy legs and flat shoes are signifiers of a most coarse nature.Avoid this as you would the Pox'
    'A delicately turned ankle,feminine boots and stockings on a gently curving leg-you may surely go for this girl'
    'If you are constantly observing the back of your beloved's legs during your courtship,remember this:you will always have to play second fiddle to her'
    'Thin yet muscular legs are best for a man who likes his household run with military precision-she will get up early in the morning to blow up the servants(?!)'
    'There is one accompaniment to the delicately turned ankle which many a man will find a source of great happiness-red hair.Propose at once'.
    'If the legs of a woman are very masculine,fly from a woman so endowed,she will be no use at all'...

    The Copyright Monster has made me tell you that my avatar is courtesy of the wonderful Alice XZ.And you don't want to annoy the Copyright Monster.

  • #2
    Quoth Kit-Ginevra View Post
    Which I happen to have found kicking around a book store. Some of its comments are priceless...

    'No woman on the stage will ever make a respectable wife.Although most easily observed,she has shown every part of herself to a paying audience.Distrust a woman who will show her legs on the stage'
    someone needs an anatomy lesson
    Interviewer: What is your greatest weakness?
    Me: I expect competence from my coworkers.

    Comment


    • #3
      Quoth Kit-Ginevra View Post
      'There is one accompaniment to the delicately turned ankle which many a man will find a source of great happiness-red hair.Propose at once'.
      I'm sorry, I have trouble arguing with this point, and my history tends to prove that.

      "The Customer Is Always Right...But The Bartender Decides Who Is
      Still A Customer."

      Comment


      • #4
        OK, wait--how are you to know what type of legs she has if showing them makes her like a showgirl and unsuitable? Wow, Victorians were weird.
        "Is it hot in here to you? It's very warm, isn't it?"--Nero, probably

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        • #5
          Quoth Food Lady View Post
          OK, wait--how are you to know what type of legs she has if showing them makes her like a showgirl and unsuitable? Wow, Victorians were weird.
          I think the better question is 'Why the hell were they so freakin' obsessed with legs'.
          "Things that fail to kill me make me level up." ~ NateWantsToBattle, Training Hard (Counting Stars parody)

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          • #6
            Quoth firecat88 View Post
            I think the better question is 'Why the hell were they so freakin' obsessed with legs'.
            Because menfolk tend to get obsessed with the parts of the woman they can't see, and in Victorian times, the legs were usually obscured under layers and layers of petticoats and suchlike.

            Victorian folks would be scandalized by what women wear (or don't wear) today.
            PWNADE(TM) - Serve up a glass today! | PWNZER - An act of pwnage so awesome, it's like the victim got hit by a tank.

            There are only Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse because I choose to walk!

            Comment


            • #7
              ...And yet, Can-Can dancers were a thing. For them, supposedly, what they didn't wear under those billowing skirts was the main point of interest.
              "For a musician, the SNES sound engine is like using Crayola Crayons. Nobuo Uematsu used Crayola Crayons to paint the Sistine Chapel." - Jeremy Jahns (re: "Dancing Mad")
              "The difference between an amateur and a master is that the master has failed way more times." - JoCat
              "Thinking is difficult, therefore let the herd pronounce judgment!" ~ Carl Jung
              "There's burning bridges, and then there's the lake just to fill it with gasoline." - Wiccy, reddit
              "Retail is a cruel master, and could very well be the most educational time of many people's lives, in its own twisted way." - me
              "Love keeps her in the air when she oughta fall down...tell you she's hurtin' 'fore she keens...makes her a home." - Capt. Malcolm Reynolds, "Serenity" (2005)
              Acts of Gord – Read it, Learn it, Love it!
              "Our psychic powers only work if the customer has a mind to read." - me

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              • #8
                It's my understanding that in Victorian times, people (especially the upper crust) were so prudish that they'd cover up piano and table legs. Also, look up "bathing machine". Basically a hut on wheels. Someone going to the beach would change from their street clothes into their bathing suit (which, of course, would extend from neck to knees) in the hut, and servants (not necessarily personal servants - probably hired along with rental of the hut) would roll it into the water so the bather wouldn't be exposed while walking to the shore.
                Any fool can piss on the floor. It takes a talented SC to shit on the ceiling.

                Comment


                • #9
                  Quoth EricKei View Post
                  ...And yet, Can-Can dancers were a thing. For them, supposedly, what they didn't wear under those billowing skirts was the main point of interest.
                  I guess the thinking was you could look at 'em, but they weren't the kind of girl to marry.

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Yup.

                    It's the 'madonna/whore' dichotomy; and it's found in many cultures: both historically and currently. Note that many people don't like that particular name for it, but it's the phrase I can most easily find explanations of the dichotomy when googling.

                    The short form is this:
                    Good Women (Madonnas) are chaste, are - in most such cultures - virgin when married with no experience of sexuality. Good Women never express sexuality in public, they are Above Such Course Things. Good Women maintain their family's honour and social standing.
                    (From such thinking comes the 'female hysteria' diagnosis - have fun googling that phrase!)

                    Whores are unsuited for Gentlemen to marry, nor for anyone who wishes to maintain a Social Standing. Perhaps the Course Creatures of the Lower Classes would marry such women, but no Man Of Worth.
                    Any woman who expresses sexuality in public is instantly a Whore (not necessarily a prostitute, but a 'Whore-class female' in this dichotomy).
                    Any woman who becomes pregnant when unmarried, except by proven rape, is automatically a Whore. Noting that proving rape is almost a matter of having multiple Gentlemen witness it.


                    I'm stopping right here, I promised a short summary of the dichotomy: those of you who are interested can google and can follow the googling path.

                    But this is why the Victorian etiquette books are so forceful in what Ladies do and don't do; while the gentlemen were happily going and ogling the can-can dancers and keeping mistresses on the side.
                    The men were marrying Madonnas - and their wives and daughters had to stay on the Madonna side of the dichotomy to maintain social standing - and enjoying 'whores' (whether or not the women sold sex, they're still on that side of the dichotomy).



                    Now that we have this bit of background: Kit-Ginevra, found any more fun snippets?
                    Seshat's self-help guide:
                    1. Would you rather be right, or get the result you want?
                    2. If you're consistently getting results you don't want, change what you do.
                    3. Deal with the situation you have now, however it occurred.
                    4. Accept the consequences of your decisions.

                    "All I want is a pretty girl, a decent meal, and the right to shoot lightning at fools." - Anders, Dragon Age.

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      Reading this thread reminded of an old book, oddly enough given to me by my mother, titled The Young Husband's Book published in 1839. There is a companion volume titled The Young Wife published in 1838. Although published in the early Victorian Era, they are works of an American author.

                      There are many amusing passages, but I will point out only one passage regarding sobriety in The Young Wife at pages 192-199. The author did not approve of the consumption of tea or coffee, considering them to be intoxicating (arousing excitement) and having no nutritional value.

                      I will leave to others to post other illuminating passages they find amusing.
                      "I don't have to be petty. The Universe does that for me."

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        On the Dichotomy -- see also Jane Austen. (been a loooong time since I read her stuff tho)

                        Some of her work centers around a well-to-do guy courting a well-to-do girl, and trying to decide whether she's a "flirt" (a nice he's interested in that he can marry) or a "coquette" (a girl he's interested in that he can screw and throw away); the words are pretty much synonymous these days, but not so back then. His choice over which one she is seems to vary frequently, and over things that we would consider innocuous or ridiculous - by today's standards, things that would generally be considered totally innocent or even unworthy of mention.
                        "For a musician, the SNES sound engine is like using Crayola Crayons. Nobuo Uematsu used Crayola Crayons to paint the Sistine Chapel." - Jeremy Jahns (re: "Dancing Mad")
                        "The difference between an amateur and a master is that the master has failed way more times." - JoCat
                        "Thinking is difficult, therefore let the herd pronounce judgment!" ~ Carl Jung
                        "There's burning bridges, and then there's the lake just to fill it with gasoline." - Wiccy, reddit
                        "Retail is a cruel master, and could very well be the most educational time of many people's lives, in its own twisted way." - me
                        "Love keeps her in the air when she oughta fall down...tell you she's hurtin' 'fore she keens...makes her a home." - Capt. Malcolm Reynolds, "Serenity" (2005)
                        Acts of Gord – Read it, Learn it, Love it!
                        "Our psychic powers only work if the customer has a mind to read." - me

                        Comment


                        • #13
                          From George Wood's 'Vitalogy' on choosing the gender of a baby

                          'When it is desired to bless the household with a male child,the husband should take substantial food,moderate exercise,pass his time pleasantly in the society of gay women,read amusing books and abstain from cohabitation for a period previous to the procreative period. During the same time,the expectant wife should live sparingly(particularly on vegetables),fatigue herself every day,take some medicines that reduce the sexual passion and pass her time in the society of dry old women.A common and convenient remedy for this purpose is the yellow powder obtained by threshing hops-it should be taken in doses of six to ten grains three times a day'.

                          If the husband's hanging out with the society of gay women,it seems unlikely that any child will be on the way soon... :P
                          The Copyright Monster has made me tell you that my avatar is courtesy of the wonderful Alice XZ.And you don't want to annoy the Copyright Monster.

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                          • #14
                            Quoth Kit-Ginevra View Post
                            If the husband's hanging out with the society of gay women,it seems unlikely that any child will be on the way soon... :P
                            George Wood died in 1875. At the time "gay women" had a somewhat different meaning than today. It referred to the type of women in the OP that men should avoid marrying.
                            "I don't have to be petty. The Universe does that for me."

                            Comment


                            • #15
                              This very much reminds me of all of those 1940s and 50s (and maybe into the 1960s) grade and high school "education" films that MST3K riffed and I personally thought even back then "What a load of crap".

                              Ya know the ones like
                              Good Girsl DON'T
                              Personal hygine
                              Appearance
                              Dating
                              I'm lost without a paddle and headed up SH*T creek.
                              -- Life Sucks Then You Die.


                              "I'll believe corp. are people when Texas executes one."

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