H05011 HARDY LETTER ON WOMEN'S SUFFRAGE - 2/5/05 - HARDY FORUM ARCHIVES ____________________________________________________________________________
From: robert_goddard@hotmail.com
Subject: Hardy letter
Date: February 5, 2005 2:55:01 AM PST
Dear All,
I wonder if I might seek the views of list members with regard to something that's been puzzling me. It concerns a Hardy letter I have recently seen advertised for sale. The letter is dated 5 August 1909 and is on Max Gate notepaper. It's addressed to Henry Nevinson, and in it Hardy observes:
"... I think the position of women one of the ninety nine things in a hundred that are wrong in this so-called civilized time, & that the vote is theirs by right (though whether it will be for their benefit at first I have some doubt): but I fancy the tactics which were a help to them when a novelty are now doing their cause harm. I was in the crowd at their last attempt to present their petition - in fact a girl-friend of mine was one of them - but I felt the plan of procedure would have to be changed for something new..".
I wonder if anyone knows to whom Hardy was referring when describing a "girl-friend" and if this letter is within Purdy & Millgate's Collected Letters? (Where, perhaps, the answer to my question might be found!). I've looked in my copy of Millgate's Selected Letters, and elsewhere, without success. I apologise in advance if this is an inappropriate use of the Hardy E-mail forum.
With best wishes,
Robert Goddard
UK
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From: Rosemarie.morgan@yale.edu
Subject: Re: Hardy letter
Date: February 5, 2005 6:34:50 AM PST
Hi Robert --
Your query is most appropriate to TTHA's Forum -- indeed, and thank you for it.
Yes the letter is in the Purdy-Millgate Collection ( I have the electronic version -- hence my speedy reply!).
Vol III, 39.
The Note on the letter is as follows:
Nevinson: Henry Woodd Nevinson, essayist and journalist; see III.223. this paper: probably a letter or petition protesting against the additional sentences given two suffragettes (and hunger-strikers) on 4 August 1909; they were in fact quickly released. their last attempt: evidently the 'Bill of Rights' deputation to the House of Commons, 29 June 1909, or one of the later attempts to present a petition to the Prime Minister (Asquith) directly. girl-friend of mine: possibly FED but more probably May Sinclair, who was active in the suffragist cause at this period; at forty-five she would still have seemed young to the sixty-nine-year-old TH. in Dorset again: Nevinson had visited TH at Max Gate in 1906.
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END OF NOTE
There are some other interesting letters in this volume on the suffrage question. One is TH's response to Lord Curzon's request that he sign an anti-suffrage petition. Referring to this in a letter to Emma TH sounds quite indignant (for him!).
Best,
Rosemarie
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From: fsiedow@omniglobal.net
Subject: Re: Hardy letter
Date: February 5, 2005 3:07:16 PM PST
ROSEMARIE WROTE: ....There are some other interesting letters in this volume on the suffrage question. One is TH's response to Lord Curzon's request that he sign an anti-suffrage petition. Referring to this in a letter to Emma TH sounds quite indignant (for him!).
Best,
Rosemarie
I don't know if anyone cares, but I have been reading letters too, lately: in a couple of Emma's ltrs she renounces her membership in the suffrage movement, and if I remember rightly, asks for her membership $$ back, because they had gotten into violence; vandalism, rock throwing at people/police, etc. She was pretty adamant and scolding toward them for their actions, admitting that she still, though, believed in the basic tenets of the movement. Fred Siedow
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From: Rosemarie.morgan@yale.edu
Subject: Re: Hardy letter
Date: February 5, 2005 4:04:02 PM PST
Yes-- you are correct. Fred. You are presumably thinking of Emma's letter of August 1912 to the London Society for Women's Suffrage?
The militancy of the Suffragettes often alienated the Suffragists-- of which (latter) Emma was one.
In common with some other more radical (historical) political/ideological groups whose mission it was/is to do or die -- from the Christian suicide-martyrs of old through to the Islamic suicide-martyrs of today -- the Suffragettes were prepared to give up their lives for the cause (and did) . This proved to be too extreme for Emma Hardy who wrote, as you say, to resign from all affiliation with the Suffrage movement (although there were several suffrage factions -- as there are today, among enfranchisement groups worldwide).
Thank you for your insights, Fred,
Cheers,
Rosemarie
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From: robert_goddard@hotmail.com
Subject: Re: Hardy letter
Date: February 7, 2005 1:55:09 AM PST
To: HARDY-L@csusm.edu
Reply-To: HARDY-L@csusm.edu
Dear Rosemarie and Fred,
Thank you both for your very prompt and helpful contributions. The note reproduced by Rosemarie from the Collected Letters was (as we should expect) very informative. In my ignorance, I had wondered whether Hardy was referring to Agnes Grove.
You might be interested to learn that I've recently seen another Hardy letter for sale. This one (according to the seller) is not within the Collected Letters, and it's interesting because it sheds a little more light on TH's entry in "Men of the Time". The "Men of the Time" entry is discussed by Millgate in "Thomas Hardy's Public Voice", where it is suggested (if I remember correctly) that Hardy may have contributed to its content. In this letter, on Max Gate notepaper, dated Nov 16, 1886 and not cited by Millgate in "Public Voice", Hardy addresses the publisher in the following terms:
"If you have not gone to press with 'Men of the Time' I should feel obliged by the omission of the sentence in the notice of myself which states that I reside near Dorchester & am a magistrate".
With best wishes,
Robert Goddard, UK.
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