The Right Sort of Woman: Victorian Travel Writers and the Fitness of an Empire (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9781443836371)

The rhetoric surrounding Empire, freedom, and adventure are nowhere more striking than in nineteenth-century British women's travel writing. The Right Sort of Woman charts the progression of British feminism in relationship to exploration of the Empire. Precious McKenzie introduces us to the lesser known writings of Florence Douglas Dixie, Mrs. Aubrey Le Blond, and Isabel Savory, and also revisits the more widely read travel texts of Isabella Bird Bishop and Mary Kingsley. Their travel writings explore the hotly debated Victorian ideologies of femininity, equality, and fitness. McKenzie contends that British women travel writers found opportunities for freedom when traveling abroad. Women travelers could participate in what were traditionally men's sports - hunting, riding, canoeing, shooting, mountaineering - when far away from strict Victorian social codes of behavior. Because of their athletic pursuits while abroad, British women travelers found their health improved as did their self-reliance and self-confidence. McKenzie considers how sports shaped the British feminist movement and then became integral to the revolutionary image of the New Woman at the fin de siecle.

Author: Precious McKenzie Stearns
ISBN-10: 1443836370
ISBN-13: 9781443836371
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
Language: English
Published: 01/20/2012
Pages: 160
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 0.80lbs
Size: 8.10h x 6.00w x 0.80d