(no subject)

[oulfis]

I picked up Between Women: Friendship, Desire, and Marriage in Victorian England and encountered an anecdote that fascinated me:

One of adolescent Emily Shore's several intimates, Elizabeth, gave her a "chain made of her beautiful rich brown hair" before leaving England, which Shore considered a token of her friend's affection and looked forward to displaying as a sign of social distinction: "I have generally worn a pretty little chain of bought hair, and when people have asked me 'whose hair is that?' have have been mortified at being obliged to answer 'Nobody's.' Now, when asked the same question, I shall be able to say it is the hair of my best and dearest friend." (Marcus 57)

It didn't surprise me that friends might exchange hair jewelry (and Marcus has firmly established that these girls were "just" friends; this section is about the actual friendships that get overlooked when scholars are too eager to dwell on the "friends" who were lovers or partners) -- but it does surprise me somewhat that "bought hair" was a phenomenon!

I suppose, when hair jewelry is a common sentimental accessory, someone might wish to look like the other fashionable, interesting girls regardless of whether one has a beloved to memorialize. I would have thought that one might ask for hair from a less-interesting relative -- maybe a mother, if she doesn't have (or care much for) a sister? But it seems not!

Comments

[breathedout]

Oh, fascinating! I wonder if your scenarios happened too, but depending on the mother/daughter or the girl's relationship to her larger family, mining your familial network for hair might be a non-starter? In which case the girl in question would have to resort to the open market.

[anarfea]

Someone rec'd this book to me as possible good source material for my novel. Do you agree?

[oulfis]

Hmmm! I really like it so I'd rec it in general, but I don't know if it would end up being incredibly relevant to your novel. The most useful thing, I think, would be to have a wealth of examples of how Victorian women talked about their relationships with other women, whether those relationships with friendly, romantic, or sexual. And a lot of information about how those relationships would have been seen and interpreted by the people around them. So if you were writing an F/F relationship I'd say absolutely pick this book up.

But, there's pretty intentionally no real information about men. And very little relevant to gender identity so far. I've encountered a brief paragraph to the effect that a bit of recreational crossdressing was not unthinkable or unforgivable for either gender, but no discussion (yet..?) about potential transgender identities. So there's nothing to inform your characterization of Sherlock, and not really anything much for Hooper either, at least for later in Hooper's life. You'd get an idea of what Hooper's childhood might have been like, gender-wise, but that might not be worth the time of reading the book. Though the book itself is worth the time of reading the book, if you're interested in it!