51 Samantha St. John – Music and Women Singers in the Victorian Era
Samantha St. John (She/Her/Hers) is a Senior from Coalinga, CA and she wrote this paper as part of a final project for the L335 Victorian Literature English class which focuses on music and women singers during the Victorian era as they are portrayed and perceived in the literature of the time. This is a shortened excerpt that conveys the “meat and potatoes” of the paper and the discussion points she made in it. Samantha’s love of literature and literary analysis has grown during her time at IUE, and she hopes readers appreciate the historical, cultural, and literary aspects of the paper. When not writing papers, Samantha enjoys spending time with her husband and their dogs, reading, creative writing, and playing a variety of games with friends. This work was prepared for Alisa Clapp-Itnyre’s English L335, who states, “Samantha wrote an amazing paper on Music and Women Singers in the Victorian Era. She even used my book:) I was very proud of my prodigy, and delighted that she found the music and these two novelists as intriguing as I did.”
Music and Women Singers in the Victorian Era (Excerpt)
The Victorian Era saw the rise of many accomplishments, some that would change the world, and be felt even in today’s modern era. This era saw the rise of industrialism, advancements in scientific theory, political unrest, resurgence of art and the new social theories that arose along with it, and a celebration of music that included the desire to capture and preserve folk songs that were in danger of dying out. While there were many advancements made in both music and literature during the Victorian era, the portrayal of this music in literature, and the social issues it evoked, especially regarding women, is what is of the most interest in this paper. In this paper, I will examine how Victorian writers used and portrayed music in their literary works, specifically, how this music often perpetuated the “male gaze” on women singers, and in doing so argue that this divisive topic often placed women in a difficult position within society. These women singers faced the difficulties of being undermined by the attitudes of the male gaze. For many women, the use of music and singing allowed them the opportunity to delve into many of the social and political issues they faced, meaning their contributions become compromised by a dismissive attitude brought about by the male gaze. As this affected women across all social classes and background, this is then shown to be a cultural issue that the Victorian people needed to deal with. The literary works I will examine are Elizabeth Gaskell’s Mary Barton (1848), Thomas Hardy’s Far from the Madding Crowd (1874), and Alfred, Lord Tennyson’s “The Lady of Shalott” (1832).
Part I: Cultural Background
The Victorian era had a list of its own social and political issues that spanned much of the century. With industrialism came the social issues tied to the wages and working conditions for many of the working class, particularly regarding the women and children who worked in factories. Religion was a forerunning concern in the minds of Victorians in two ways: the first stemming from the splintering of the church in the 1600s when people grew frustrated and found fault with the Catholic Church, but by the Victorian era saw a resurgence through the High Church bringing it back, and the second came with the rise of conflict between religion and science when theories of evolution began circulating, the most prominent being Charles Darwin’s own theories. Women faced many issues both socially and politically as they struggled to have equal rights to men, from fighting to have and keep their own money, educational reform that would allow women the same educational opportunities as men, and of course, the right to vote. Socially, women were expected to be meek, submissive to their husbands, and pure; in short, “the angel in the house,” as the title of Coventry Patmore’s poem suggests and describes these expectations.
There are a few talking points expressed in Alisa Clapp-Itnyre’s book Angelic Airs, Subversive Songs that are continued within this paper. Clapp-Itnyre states an interest on the topic of Victorian literature and music and the resulting discussion as a “consideration of gender alongside class as I examine music idealization—and literature’s response to it—in a larger musical-historical, sociopolitical context” (xvii). In keeping a focus on Victorian writers, Clapp-Itnyre notes the relationship between music and politics in Victorian culture, as well as how these different writers expressed these issues. This includes how Elizabeth Gaskell “expurgates political messages from the ballads cited in her novels” to the way Thomas Hardy “highlights the sexual implications of folk songs in his novels” (Clapp-Itnyre xix). In addition to emphasizing these problematic attitudes regarding music and culture, as well as how women were then undermined by these same cultural issues, as expressed in novels done by Gaskell and Hardy, I delve into a poem by Alfred, Lord Tennyson. In doing so, I aim to illustrate that these cultural issues were abundant in the Victorian era long before they became forerunning issues of their time.
Music in this era was often either orally done—singers, choirs, hymns—or with a musical instrument, and in both cases was an in-person or visual event. Within the context of social class standing, such issues were heightened by the ownership of musical instruments, as a piano, for example, often depicted a visible class distinction between those with money and those owning more traditional instruments such as fiddles and flutes (Clapp-Itnyre 176). For many people of the middle class, the sexual undertones often found in folk songs were problematic, especially as it directly conflicted with the image of angelic purity that women had to uphold for fear of becoming social pariahs. Additionally, many songs of the working class conveyed charged political messages that also attributed to middle-class discomfort, and such messages also conflicted with the image of angelic purity because the women singing these songs could then be seen as challenging the status quo of meek, submissive wives. Even when folk songs appeared in literature, there was some concern over their contents, and this struggle is evident in the work of many authors as some actively changed or modified these songs to better align with their own comfort while few chose to keep the lyrics unchanged and true to the source.
Elizabeth Gaskell, author of Mary Barton, is known as a middle-class author within the Victorian era, and lived a much different life than the working-class families of whom she tended to write. While she often has women singers in her works, the songs she offers in her writing tend to be modified from their original source, leaving them moderated as far as the intensity of their message. Another middle-class author, Tennyson, had the opportunity of attending Trinity College, Cambridge and being named Poet Laureate of England in 1850, the same year he wrote In Memoriam. The struggles Tennyson battles are reflective of the very same cultural issues prevalent throughout the Victorian era, so it is no surprise that his poem, “The Lady of Shallot,” also accentuates the social and political issues faced by women singers, and in fact, stands as an early representation of these problems which are then echoed in the works of other authors. Thomas Hardy, on the other hand, was born into a poor family, and often heard folk songs with unmodified lyrics, that is, they were unchanged for him, and he often kept the folk songs he wrote into his works true to these unmodified versions. It often, throughout his career as a writer, gave him considerable trouble with middle-class critics who took issue with the graphic nature—according to Victorian standards—of these songs.
Part II: Literary Analysis
The women in Gaskell’s literature often come together in groups in the wake of the changes and hardships they endured daily, and that by coming together they are reconciled to this environmental change, lamenting these changes through music (Clapp-Itnyre 46). This is especially true in Gaskell’s Mary Barton, a tale that follows working-class families in Manchester, England with the rise of textile factories which forced the weavers of the countryside to move to large cities in the hope of obtaining a factory job. Despite the socially and politically charged atmosphere these women lived through, the music portrayed in Gaskell is often muted in expressing these issues. This altering of song lyrics, or more accurately the inclination to avoid adding in the lyrics that would trouble a middle-class author—no matter how sympathetic to the working-class—has earned Gaskell some criticism as she denies the full experience these songs wish to convey.
In Mary Barton, Margaret Jennings, the granddaughter of Job Legh and friend to Mary Barton, is Gaskell’s only professional musician. Margaret’s singing voice is celebrated both by her personal community and those more broadly and even becomes a commodity that her grandfather will use when he “wanted to prove his gratitude” (Gaskell 154). Margaret’s voice soon earns her the chance to begin singing for the Mechanics’ Society, even being paid to do so, and for Margaret this is a welcome blessing as at this point in the novel her eyesight has become so poor that she is effectively blind. Unable to stitch or sew for a living, as she had been doing, she welcomes the opportunity to earn money by using her voice. However, Margaret’s singing upsets multiple issues from both a political and social stance. First, when she sings music for her own personal community, or even others that extended through the rest of the working-class of Manchester, Margaret often sings “politically charged union songs such as ‘The Oldham Weaver’” yet after her employment with the Mechanics’ Society was told to sing “innocuous parlor songs” (Clapp-Itnyre 53).
The second issue behind Margaret’s growing career as a singer is reflected in the gender issues and the “male gaze” her new position attracts. Linda Shires defines this gazing as “most prominent in this novel when the male looks at the female” (167), and while Shires’ article, “Narrative, Gender, and Power in Far from the Madding Crowd” is concerned with Hardy’s own novel—which will be discussed in detail later—the point she makes on the “male gaze” is contextually appropriate for Gaskell’s novel, too. Often, male audience members presented the problem in that they “see the sexual woman more than the musician” (Clapp-Itnyre 53), which creates a unique gender-related issue in that women, who are meant to be meek, submissive, and pure, are now openly recognized as sexual beings. The audience members at the Mechanics’ Society cheer with avid approval for Margaret’s performances, and Gaskell’s description of this approval highlights this shift in perception, “for they’d clapped and stamped after I’d done, till I began to wonder how many pairs o’ shoes they’d get through a week at that rate, let alone their hands” (95).
In Hardy’s Far from the Madding Crowd, Bathsheba Everdene is a young woman farmer, whose beauty attracts the male gaze of three different suitors. The intensity of their gazes differs, and the outcome for these men also varies in intensity. While Gabriel Oak is the first man to gaze at Bathsheba, and does so throughout the text, the intensity of it shifts as the story unfolds. In short, he “modifies his gaze to accommodate changing circumstances, resolving not to be governed by an uncontrollable male desire” (Shires 168). Sergeant Francis Troy’s gazing “is more sexually aggressive than Oak’s but is by no means one-sided” (Shires 167), and Hardy introduces an important new angle to the topic by suggesting that women are as sexually aware as gazers as their male counterparts. Farmer Boldwood, the oldest of Bathsheba’s would-be suitors, gazes most perniciously and unrelentingly in the novel, as his looks go everywhere, as insinuated by Hardy, choosing to idealize and objectify Bathsheba even after she first rejects him (Shires 168).
Given Hardy’s own upbringing amongst folk culture and folk songs, and the pastoral elements of Far from the Madding Crowd, it is unsurprising to see that much of the music in the novel aligns with those same elements. Hardy uses music to showcase multiple aspects of this cultural experience at different points in the novel. After the supper commemorating the end of the sheep-shearing session, the attendees engage in an exchange of music, which Hardy uses to emphasize how such songs were an active and important part of people’s lives. Joseph Poorgrass sings “The Seeds of Love,” and Hardy has no trouble quoting the actual words of the song, “I sow-ed the-e seeds of love, / I-it was all i-in the-e spring / I-in A-pril, Ma-ay, a-nd sun-ny June, / When sma-all bi-irds they do sing” (Hardy 165). The sexual implications of the song are quite apparent as the “seeds of love” being sowed, the springtime references, and even the singing birds all point to themes of sexuality, lovemaking, and eventual childrearing.
Tennyson’s “The Lady of Shalott” is an enchanting lyric poem that tells the story of the Lady of Shalott, who lives in a tower isolated from the people of Camelot. The characters and setting of which are inspired from Sir Thomas Malory’s Le Morte D’arthur. She is an artist in two ways, first as a mimetic artist who uses a magic mirror depicting the people of Camelot which she then copies onto the tapestries she weaves, and secondly as an artist in her own right as she sings while working. However, due to her isolation from other people, the Lady of Shalott is often relegated to a mythical creature, “And by the moon the reaper weary, / Piling sheaves in uplands airy, / Listening, whispers “‘Tis the fairy Lady of Shalott’” (lines 33-35). This presents something of a conundrum as all throughout the Victorian era, women singers attract the male gaze, and this gazing is the effect of gender-related issues steeped in sexual awareness, which in turn directly conflicts with the social-related issues of women as the “angel in the house.” Tennyson’s work, as the precursor to the two novels spoken of in this essay, perhaps then sets the stage for this way of thinking. The male gaze alighting on women singers is the product of sexual awareness, and themes of lovemaking and childrearing echo this representation in the folk songs of the era.
The music in Tennyson’s poem alters as it progresses, and the relation between women and music perhaps sets the stage for many of the social and gender issues of the era, which writers like Gaskell and Hardy emulate in their own novels. Despite living an isolated life, the Lady of Shalott seems happy to spend her days weaving tapestries and singing, although it is only reapers in the early morning that, “Hear a song that echoes cheerly” (line 30). Lancelot’s entry into the poem comes as the knight is on the road to Camelot as he sings “‘Tirra lirra,’ by the river” (line 107). The Lady sees him through her magic mirror, which cracks and signals that the curse that threatens her is now upon her, which she now recognizes as her end (lines 115-116). The Lady’s final song, far from being cheerful, is in a completely different attitude as those who hear it, “Heard a carol, mournful, holy, / Chanted loudly, chanted lowly” (lines 145-146). If the Lady is unable to truly experience the community living that was so evident in Hardy’s novel, or in the community of shared experiences in Gaskell’s novel, then her descent to death—and the way music highlights this course—in Tennyson’s poem lays the groundwork on how important music was even to social and political issues throughout the Victorian era.
Although music was enjoyed by many Victorians, there were opposing social and gender-related issues tied to music. Given that women were seen as meek, submissive, and pure, their music needed to reflect that, leading to some authors, such as Gaskell, to moderate the lyrics of the folk songs that made it into their works. The reason for modifying lyrics came from different lines of reasoning, such as showing women coming together, focusing on the socializing of women, while also refraining from political topics that would have been uncomfortable for the middle-class. For authors like Hardy, however, the preservation of these folk songs was important, and he felt it necessary to list their lyrics faithfully and truthfully, which meant showing that folk song music was very aware of lovemaking, childrearing, and raising families that often went on, regardless of what social class a family was part of. Women singers were then in a uniquely difficult situation as social-related issues relegated them to the “angel in the house” status, but gender-related issues through the “male gaze” of audience members denoted women as sexual beings, and more troubling is in how the use of the male gaze began to undermine the messages or contributions of these women. Music for women in the Victorian era was, then, often tied up in issues of a contradictory nature that women were forced to navigate carefully if they were to avoid becoming social pariahs.
Works Cited
Clapp-Itnyre, Alisa. Angelic Airs, Subversive Songs. Ohio University Press, 2002.
Gaskell, Elizabeth. Mary Barton. Penguin Books, 2003.
Hardy, Thomas. Far from the Madding Crowd. Modern Library, 2001.
Shires, Linda M. “Narrative, Gender, and Power in Far from the Madding Crowd.” Novel: A Forum on Fiction, vol. 24, no. 2, 1991, pp. 162–77. https://doi-org.proxyeast.uits.iu.edu/10.2307/1345561.
Tennyson, Alfred. “The Lady of Shalott.” The Norton Anthology of English Literature: The Victorian Age, edited by Stephen Greenblatt, 10th ed., vol. E, W.W. Norton and Company, 2018.