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Cover of Women's Suffrage Literature

Women's Suffrage Literature

Edited by Katharine Cockin; Glenda Norquay; Sowon S. Park

  • Published: 11 Nov 2004
  • DOI: 10.4324/9780415357449
  • Set ISBN: 9780415357449

Set Contents

Suffrage Drama


The striking sights of women’s suffrage activism, their spectacular actions, banners and symbols, made an immediate impression on public consciousness. On both sides of the campaign, posters, cartoons and postcards deployed thought-provoking images accompanied by captions which re-created the dialogue between the characters depicted. Many women joining the campaign were alert to new ways of expressing the arguments for the vote, whether to convert others or explain to anxious or hostile relatives. The plays performed during the British women’s suffrage movement are usually more complex than the explicitly propagandist posters which hailed the spectator to take up only one available position. In the unfolding of plot and character through dialogue, various arguments for women’s suffrage could be set out for an audience already in agreement but in need of training in the arts of persuasion. Thus How the Vote Was Won and Mr Peppercorn’s Awakening transform the most unlikely males (or females such as the Daily Mail-reading Aunt in Our Happy Home) into supporters. The acerbic ending to How the Vote Was Won presents a difficult lesson: that the vote will only be achieved by legislative change by a majority of the members of an exclusively male parliament. Implicitly, the play reminds its audience, the end will be brought about by diverse motives, including self-interest.

Volume Contents

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    Front Matter
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    Introduction to Volume III By Katharine Cockin; Glenda Norquay; Sowon S. Park
  • Pioneer Players and Actresses’ Franchise League
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      18
      The First Actress, privately printed, n.d. [first performed at the Kingsway Theatre, 8 May 1911] By Christopher St. John
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      In The Workhouse (London: International Suffrage Shop, 1911) By Margaret Wynne Nevinson
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        Preface
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        In the Workhouse
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      20
      The Coronation (London: International Suffrage Shop, 1911) By Christopher St. John; Charles Thursby
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      21
      How the Vote Was Won (London: Edith Craig, 1913) By Cicely Hamilton; Christopher St. John
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      22
      A Pageant of Great Women (London: International Suffrage Shop, 1910) By Cicely Hamilton
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      23
      ‘Honour Thy Father’, in Three One-Act Plays (London: Ernest Benn, 1926) pp. 27-57 By H. M. Harwood
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      24
      An Englishwoman’s Home (Actresses’ Franchise League, n.d.) By H. Arncliffe Sennett
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      25
      How One Woman Did It, privately printed, n.d. By John Austin
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      26
      The Apple (Actresses’ Franchise League, n.d.) By Inez Bensusan
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      27
      Before Sunrise (Actresses’ Franchise League, n.d.) [first performed at the Albert Hall Theatre, London, 11 December 1909] By Bessie Hatton
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      28
      A Woman's Influence (Actresses’ Franchise League, n.d.) By Gertrude Jennings
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      29
      An Anti-Suffragist or The Other Side (Actresses’ Franchise League, n.d.) By H. M. Paull
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      The Woman With the Pack (London: W. J. Ham- Smith, 1912) [first performed at the Portman Rooms, Baker Street, 8 December 1911 by the Actresses’Franchise League] By G. Vaughan
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        Author’s Note
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        The’ First Performance
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        Scenes
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        First Tableau
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        Scene I
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        Scene II
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        Scene III
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        Scene IV
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        Second Tableau
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        Practical Hints for Amateurs
  • Plays in Periodicals
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      31
      ‘Our Happy Home’, The Vote, 30 December 1911, p. 115 By Edith M. Baker
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      32
      ‘The New Socrates’, The Vote, 29 August 1913, p. 293 By H. S.
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      33
      ‘The Shadow of the Sofa’, The Vote, 24 December 1913, pp. 139-41 By A. L. Little
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      34
      [Helen McLachlan], ‘The Mad Hatter’s Tea Party Up To Date’, The Vote, 20 April 1912, p.  11 By Helen McLachlan
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      35
      ‘Mr Peppercorn’s Awakening’, The Vote, 1 August 1913, p. 229 By N. A.
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      36
      Henry W. Nevinson, ‘The Cabinet Concert’, Votes for Women, 5 December 1913, p. 142 By Henry W. Nevinson
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      37
      ‘A Good-By-Election’, Votes for Women, 8 April 1910, p. 441 By W. Pett Ridge
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      38
      ‘A Red-tape Comedy’, The Vote, 16 November 1912, p. 47 By Ethel Ayres Purdie
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      39
      Lorimer Royston, ‘Little Jane and Grandmama’, Votes for Women, 16 January 1914, p. 230 By Lorimer Royston
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      40
      ‘Fair Play: A Dialogue’, Votes for Women, 13 February 1914, p.298 By Lorimer Royston
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      41
      ‘The Science of Forgiveness’, The Vote, 28 November 1913, pp. 71-2 By Winifred St Clair
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      42
      ‘Woman Old or New?’, The Vote, 31 August 1912, pp. 325-6; 7 September 1912, pp. 341-2 By Isabel C. Tippett
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      43
      Isabel Tippett, ‘The Stuff That ’Eroes Are Made Of’, The Vote, 19 August 1911, pp. 207-9 By Isabel C. Tippett
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      44
      G. Watkinson, ‘Women and Suffrage’, The Common Cause, 2 February 1911, pp. 701-3 By G. Watkinson