Katheryn Hughes claims that during the Victorian Era, \u201cA young girl was not expected to focus too obviously on finding a husband. Being \u2018forward\u2019 in the company of men suggested a worrying sexual appetite. Women were assumed to desire marriage because it allowed them to become mothers rather than to pursue sexual or emotional satisfaction (Hughes, Gender Roles in the 19th Century).\u201d However, the societal standard of sexual purity and a lack of carnal desires did not exist for men during the 19th century. In fact, many men would pay for a prostitute\u2019s services because they [these men] were eager to bed and not looking to wed. Yet, even married men would stray from their wives in search of sensual satisfaction from their standard village entrepreneur (prostitutes are really strategic opportunists if you think about it.) With the boom of this business, came the clap\u2026 and other sexually transmitted diseases that forced the Victorians to think about intercourse as a danger rather than a harmless recreational activity.<\/p>\n
Correspondingly, the female body was mystifying to artists and poets most likely because it was uncommon for a woman to present herself in an overtly suggestive manner. Fascinatingly enough, the19th century definition of \u201cprostitute\u201d did not only describe women who sold their bodies, but it was also used to label \u201cwomen who were living with men outside of marriage, women who had illegitimate children, or women who had relations with men solely for pleasurable purposes and not for monetary gain (Flanders, Prostitution).\u201d Nevertheless, women were often mistaken for prostitutes (corporeal entrepreneurs) because men would misinterpret social cues. Remarkably, a man wrote to the Times magazine in 1862 to complain that his daughters were being hassled by \u201clewd scoundrels\u201d in the streets; In the same way that the 21st century handles jeering and cat-calling, the man\u2019s concerned comment was met with a series of men who suggested that perhaps \u201cthe girls\u2019 dress or behavior had encouraged the men (Flanders, Prostitution).\u201d<\/p>\n
Similarly, La Belle Dame sans Merci by John Keats discusses a knight-at-arms who is \u201calone\u201d and \u201cpalely loitering.\u201d The knight says that the \u201charvest\u2019s done\u201d and that the \u201csedge has withered from the lake\u201d which both sound like euphemisms for dwindling sexual prowess as a result of infertility represented by the barren harvest and an inability to ejaculate which is represented by withering sedge near an uninspiring lake. Furthermore, the knight meets a woman with wild eyes and long hair who makes a \u201csweet moan\u201d when he places a garland on her head as he continues to \u201cset her on [his] pacing steed.\u201d However, once the sexual encounter between the knight and the beautiful lady finishes, the knight realizes that he has been deserted on a cold hill side where he can see other \u201cpale kings and princess [who are] death-pale.\u201d Keats details the \u201cstarved lips\u201d of the other men and ends with a discussion about the sedge that has withered from the lake, which is most likely the result of a sexually transmitted disease. Yet, it is unclear whether the last four lines of the poem suggest that the woman is left, like a prostitute, “Alone and palely loitering, Though the sedge is withered from the lake, and no birds sing.”<\/p>\n
Indeed, all of the men fall victim to their own desires and they pay for services that could endanger their health. This poem seems like a didactic tale that warns the public about prostitutes or other sexually liberated women. Yet, I wonder whether the Victorian men are afraid of female sexuality or if they are actually afraid of their own lack of self-control? It’s probably the former.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Katheryn Hughes claims that during the Victorian Era, \u201cA young girl was not expected to focus too obviously on finding a husband. Being \u2018forward\u2019 in the company of men suggested a worrying sexual appetite. Women were assumed to desire marriage because it allowed them to become mothers rather than to pursue sexual or emotional satisfaction … Continue reading Victorian Prostitutes: Alone and Palely Loitering<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3046,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[111380,111423],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1145","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-360-victorian-sexualities","category-fall-2016"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1145","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3046"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1145"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1145\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1145"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1145"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1145"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}