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Edification

 

The Lace Wearer, Rewarding the Lace Maker. Circa 1800.43

The Female Tatler purports to educate readers of both sexes. Mrs. Crackenthorpe notes at the outset: "As to particular stories, I shall begin my second paper with them; but in that, and every following piece, as I find encouragement to proceed, shall be very careful, unjustly or ungenteely not to reflect upon any person whatsoever, but gently to correct the vices and vanities which some of distinction, as well as others, willfully commit" (no. 1). Lest her readers forget, Mrs. Crackenthorpe reiterates her intentions in one of her last periodicals: "For shame, Gentlemen and Ladies, dismiss your follies, and bid adieu to your indiscretions that this Tatler of mine may have no subject to go upon and consequently be suppressed without your making interest with authority" (no. 42). Her acknowledgment that her periodical relies on human folly is somewhat self-aggrandizing: not only will human folly never cease (thus allowing the indefinite continuation of the periodical), but Mrs. Crackenthorpe will always presume upon her authority to point it out. She goes on to write: " The end of satire is reformation, and this would be of more force than your societies for that purpose, were it duly observed and hearkened to, without being misconstrued defamation. You are told your faults in order to amend them, and if characters are drawn that are injurious to your reputations, what have you to do but to disown them since…every one of you might pass for wise and virtuous, would you not think yourselves reflected upon for being otherwise" (no. 42). Educated through exaggerated portraits of themselves or people who share qualities like them, the readers of the Female Tatler (here both men and women) are expected to make practical application of the knowledge they have garnered in improving their characters.

Yet, the publication's primary focus is the education of women. "I consult the honour and interest of the ladies, with as much fervency, as the male Tatler does that of the gentlemen; and could wish as heartily to see pimps, panders, and bands as much humbled and discountenanced as the world has lately seen gamesters and sharpsters" (no. 29). Mrs. Crackenthorpe uses the word "honor" differently for women than she does for men. For women, it is their chastity; for men, it is their principles and pride. Such distinctions between the two sexes are made consistently. (See The War of the Sexes.)

Mrs. Crackenthorpe claims: "the society I aim at, are those above the common level . . . I would have the ladies to relish somewhat above mere tittle-tattle, and tho’ they want the benefit of profound learning, yet conversing with ingenious persons would so far improve their natural parts, as to give ‘em a more noble idea of things, and create in ‘em at least a value for matters serious and instructive, which would stifle a world of scandal and detraction" (no. 3). Women are capable of acting morally—despite their lack of education—only if they are exposed to those who exhibit morally desirable qualities. "Tho’ most women are fond of ridiculing one another, it was always my temper to extenuate, rather than aggravate, the frailties of my own sex, when at the same time, I have blush’d for other women’s infirmities, as much as if they had been my own. If a lady appears impertinently talkative, and will rather sermonize than converse, I impute it to her youth. Nature has given her a ready wit, which time and experience will ripen to a good judgment, for every woman that talks well must think before she speaks" (no. 5). For this reason, Mrs. Crackenthorpe disapproves of boarding schools and prefers that young women be educated at home, where parents can supervise their manners and morals, insuring they will be intelligent and demure rather than affected and wild (no. 8).

Mrs. Crackenthorpe illustrates her precepts with an example of a lady of her acquaintance, who began to feel a fashionable decline in her health as a result of her husband having lately risen in the world: "I told her that plain dealing, tho’ an unfashionable virtue, was what I always valu’d myself upon, that affectation of any kind was nature’s ugliest monster and only practiced by vain upstarts who have a wrong notion of grandeur and wou’d fain act something to distinguish themselves from their former equals, as well in temper as equipage" (no. 25). Common sense and intelligence are consistently valued over and above beauty or affectations. (See Women’s Beauty and Men’s Beauty and Fashionability.) Mrs. Crackenthorpe writes that she makes no claim to beauty, but rather prefers to claim a "tolerable understanding" and suggests that the female sex should spend "some time in cultivating their minds, and take more pains to place their words than their patches" (no. 8). And through her status as a writer, Mrs. Crackenthorpe has claimed exemplary status for and among women. Women may have been excluded from the universities and, by extension, the learned professions of medicine, law, and priesthood, but some upper-class women found opportunities through their pens.

 

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