Another quote

Posted by Marie Bernadette on December 23, 1997 at 19:38:59:

In response to quotes, written by Marie Bernadette on December 23, 1997 at 17:28:18

]
] ] Do either of these books shed any light on Leslie's original question, namely , whether there was a change in attitudes to morality during Jane Austen's lifetime? And if there was, does it correspond to a change in fashions?

There is another book called The History of Underclothes by C. Willet and Phillis Cunnington, Published by Dover, from which I offer this:
"The development of prudery, destined later to become a national characteristic, was temporarily arrested by the Napoleonic wars from 1793 to 1814. During that epoch...the moral attitude swung, for the time being, in the opposite direction in the world of fashion. There, indeed, was not only prudery apparently suspended, but with it was banished mush of the material forming our subject. Femine underclothing was reduced to a point where it almost ceased to express either class distinction or sex attraction...It was in this respect that the Regency period certainly struck an original note in feminine fashions."
And a few pages later:
"The important innovation in this period was the introduction of drawers, which had hitherto been a purely masculine garment. The adoption of it by women was the first of that long series of larcenies from the male wardrobe by which woman has marked each stage of her emancipation."
]

]
]

REPLIES:

Posting followups to old messages is disabled; instead go to the main index and post a new message which mentions this one.