Women, Travel and Identity : Journeys by Rail and Sea, 1870–1940

Explores British women's journeys abroad on steamships and trains during a period of great social, cultural and technical change, using a wide variety of sources including women's letters and diaries, contemporary art, advertising, fiction and etiquette guides. Between 1870 and 1940, a period of dramatic social, cultural and technological change, millions of British women journeyed abroad on steamships and trains, motivated by economic need, a desire to start a new life, faith, health, love, curiosity or sheer necessity. Women, travel and identity explores their experiences as journey consumers - experiences that have remained largely hidden until now, despite the journey being the most universal female travel experience of the period. Drawing upon diaries and letters, art, advertising, fiction and etiquette guides, it examines the journey's impact upon women's identities and definitions of femininity, modernity, glamour, class, travel, tourism, leisure and sexual opportunity and threat. The book explores women's relationship with train and ship technology, as well as cultural understandings and public expectations of the journey. Robinson-Tomsett also explores how women journeyed in practice, examining their use of journey space, their sociability with both Western and 'Other' non-Western journeyers, and their experience of love, sex and danger during the journey. She highlights the ways in which women fashioned a journeyer identity which fused their existing domestic identities with new identities such as the journey chronicler. It will appeal to academics, postgraduates and undergraduates studying women's and gender history; travel, transport and mobility studies; Victorian, cultural and leisure history; and postcolonial and feminist studies, as well as enthusiasts of what is considered a 'golden age' of travel featuring some of the greatest transport ever built, including the Orient Express and the Titanic. The years between 1870 and 1940 are often considered a'golden age'of travel: as larger and evermore sumptuous ships and trains were built, including the Orient Express, Blue Train, Lusitania and Normandie, journeying abroad became, and remains today, synonymous with chic, splendour and luxury. Utilising women's diaries and letters, art, advertising, fiction and etiquette guides, this book considers the journey's impact upon understandings of female identity, definitions of femininity, modernity, glamour, class, travel, tourism, leisure and sexual opportunity and threat during this period. It explores women's relationship with train and ship technology; cultural understandings of the journey; public expectations of women journeyers; how women journeyed in practice: their use of journey space, sociability with both Western and'Other'non-Western journeyers, experience of love, sex and danger during the journey; and how women fashioned a journeyer identity which fused their existing domestic identities with new journey identities such as the journey chronicler. The journey is revealed to be an experience of sociability as much as mobility, dominated by ideas of respectability and reputation, class, power, vision and observation and home as well as the foreign and new. The years between 1870 and 1940 are often considered a 'golden age' of travel: as larger and evermore sumptuous ships and trains were built, including the Orient Express, Blue Train, Lusitania and Normandie, journeying abroad became, and remains today, synonymous with chic, splendour and luxury. Utilising women's diaries and letters, art, advertising, fiction and etiquette guides, this book considers the journey's impact upon understandings of female identity, definitions of femininity, modernity, glamour, class, travel, tourism, leisure and sexual opportunity and threat during this period. It Front matter Contents List of figures List of tables Acknowledgements List of abbreviations Introduction The big luggage went a fortnight ago: making the journey abroad Fashion plate heroines: imagining the female journeyer No nice girl swears: advice, etiquette and expectation Ordering the berth: the spaces of journeying Busy practising games: scrutiny and sociability Full of wickedness: romantic opportunity and sexual hazard? Where her story begins: fashioning a journeyer identity Conclusion Appendix: Women journeyers Bibliography Index