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Fiction 1


‘We are numerous enough, we women of the press . . . fiction has made heroines of us’, declared the successful female journalist M. F. Billington in 1896. Indeed, journalism as a plot and the female journalist as fictional character are depicted in a number of fin-de-siècle novels and short stories. Fiction provides an important examination of the journalistic marketplace and women’s entry into a professional arena, mapping out the increasing prevalence of the woman journalist and the resistance encountered on the way. Male and female writers wrote about journalism and in doing so highlighted both the advantages and disadvantages of women’s participation in the newspaper and periodical press.

Volume Contents

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    Front Matter
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    Introduction By Lorna Shelley
  • Women Journalists as Characters in Fin-De-Siècle Stories
    • ‘That Dance at the Robsons’, Longman’s Magazine 15, April 1890, pp. 630–49 By Netta Syrett
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        Chapter I
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        Chapter II
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        Chapter III
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        Chapter IV
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      30
      ‘The Story of Anita’, The Author, April 1892, pp. 354–8 By Anon
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      31
      ‘Miss Lorrimore’s Career’, Sylvia’s Journal, February 1894, pp. 131–5 By E. Nesbit
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      32
      ‘The Journalistic Instinct’, The Pall Mall Magazine IV, September–December 1894, pp. 64–9 ‘BELLE’ By Belle'
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      33
      ‘A Lady Journalist’, English Illustrated Magazine, January 1895, pp. 65–73 By George Paston
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      34
      ‘A Scribbler’s Comedy’, The Pall Mall Magazine V, January–April 1895, pp. 286–94 By Ella Hepworth Dixon
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      35
      ‘Comrades in Arms’, English Illustrated Magazine 132, September 1894, pp. 1230–7 By George Gissing
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      36
      ‘Jennie Baxter, Journalist: Number I. The Daily Bugle Misses “A Hit” ’, The Windsor Magazine, December 1897, pp. 204–17 By Cottrel Hoe
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      37
      ‘The Editor of the Jonquil’, The Dome 1, October–December 1899, pp. 167–81 By J. E. Woodmeald
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      38
      ‘Flickerbridge’, Scribner’s Magazine 31, February 1902, pp. 170–80 By Henry James
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      39
      ‘Amateur Night’, in Moon-Face and Other Stories, London: William Heinemann, 1906, pp. 58–85 By Jack London
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      40
      ‘A Common Occurrence’, Harper’s New Monthly Magazine 108, February 1904. Republished in Netta Syrett, Women and Circumstance, London: Chapman and Hall, 1906, pp. 265–300 By Netta Syrett
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      41
      ‘Chapter VI: In Marigold Mansions’, in Girl Comrades, London: Blackie and Son Limited, 1907, pp. 52–60 By Ethel F. Heddle
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      42
      ‘Chapter IV: Billie in Fleet Street’, in The Bachelor Girls, London: Chapman & Hall, 1907, pp. 32–7 By Keble Howard
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      43
      ‘The Crank Of All The Ages’, Rebel Women, London: A.C. Fifield, 1910, pp. 68–74 By Evelyn Sharp
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      44
      ‘The Real Facts’, The Endless Journey and Other Stories, London: Chatto & Windus, 1912, pp. 103–26 By Netta Syrett
  • Independence, Cross-Dressing and Journalism
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      Anna Marsden’s Experiment, London: Greening & Co., 1899 By Ellen Williams
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        I
        A Lonely Girl
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        II
        Anna's Inspiration
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        III
        A New Identity
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        IV
        Congenial Employment
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        V
        Complications
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        VI
        The Play That Failed
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        VII
        A Woman's Heart
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        VIII
        Rejected
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        IX
        The Beginning of the End
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        X
        Lottie's Disillusion
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        XI
        Once More—Alone