The Mutual Admiration Society : how Dorothy L. Sayers and her Oxford circle remade the world for women

Format:

Book

Title:

The Mutual Admiration Society : how Dorothy L. Sayers and her Oxford circle remade the world for women

Author:

Moulton, Mo, 1979- author

ISBN:

9781541644472

Edition:

First edition.

Publication:

New York, NY : Basic Books, 2019.

Physical Description:

ix, 372 pages : illustrations ; 25 cm

Contents:

Arriving at Oxford -- Mutual Admiration Society on stage and page -- University passions -- Battle fronts -- Teach or marry? -- Detection and despair -- Professional motherhood -- Sleepless nights -- Departures and reunions -- Subversive spinster -- The problem of marriage -- Does it please you? -- What the busman wrought -- War breaks out -- Service and identity -- The Greengate Hospital -- Running to stand still -- Bridgeheads to the future -- Friendship and triumphs -- Legacies.

Summary:

"Dorothy L. Sayers (1893-1957) was a renowned crime novelist who achieved fame and fortune during a period that historian Mo Moulton calls 'the day after the revolution.' In a time when just as many doors were closed to women as open, Sayers found professional success with her Lord Peter Wimsey novels. Yet she never could have done it without the cohort of remarkable women she met at university -- all of whom would go on to challenge societal norms and fight for equality of opportunity in their own way. In 1912, Dorothy L. Sayers and five friends founded a writing group at Somerville College, Oxford; they called themselves the 'Mutual Admiration Society.' Smart, bold, serious, and funny, these women were also sheltered and chaperoned, barred from receiving degrees despite taking classes and passing exams. But within a few short years, World War I rapidly expanded the rights and opportunities available to women, including the right to vote (1918) and access to the professions (1919). In October 1920, members of the MAS returned to Oxford to receive full degrees. Mutual Admiration Society follows these six women as they navigate the complexities of adulthood, work, intimacy, and sex in Interwar England. Bringing these women to vivid life, Moulton reveals how Dorothy L. Sayers was intimately intertwined with the members of the MAS -- and how, together, they fought their way into modernity"-- Provided by publisher.

Personal Subject:

Sayers, Dorothy L. (Dorothy Leigh), 1893-1957-Friends and associates.

Sayers, Dorothy L. (Dorothy Leigh), 1893-1957

Corporate Subject:

Mutual Admiration Society (Somerville College (University of Oxford)) -- History.

University of Oxford -- History -- 20th century.

University of Oxford

Subject(s):

Mutual Admiration Society (Somerville College (University of Oxford)) -- History.

University of Oxford -- History -- 20th century.

Women authors, English -- Great Britain -- Biography.

Feminism and literature -- Great Britain -- History -- 20th century.

Women's rights -- Great Britain -- History -- 20th century.

Geographic Term:

Genre:

Holds:

Available:*

Library	Call Number	Status
Searching... McMinnville Public Library	823 Moulton	Searching... Unknown
Searching... Salem Main Library	921 Sayers, Dorothy L. 2019	Searching... Unknown
Searching... Silver Falls Library	920 MOULTON	Searching... Unknown

Bound With These Titles

On Order

Summary

A group biography of renowned crime novelist Dorothy L. Sayers and the Oxford women who stood at the vanguard of equal rights

Dorothy L. Sayers is now famous for her Lord Peter Wimsey and Harriet Vane detective series, but she was equally well known during her life for an essay asking "Are Women Human?" Women's rights were expanding rapidly during Sayers's lifetime; she and her friends were some of the first women to receive degrees from Oxford. Yet, as historian Mo Moulton reveals, it was clear from the many professional and personal obstacles they faced that society was not ready to concede that women were indeed fully human.

Dubbing themselves the Mutual Admiration Society, Sayers and her classmates remained lifelong friends and collaborators as they fought for a truly democratic culture that acknowledged their equal humanity. A celebration of feminism and female friendship, The Mutual Admiration Society offers crucial insight into Dorothy L. Sayers and her world.

Author Notes

Mo Moulton is currently a lecturer in the history department of the University of Birmingham. They earned their PhD in history from Brown University in 2010 and taught in the History & Literature program at Harvard University for six years. Their previous book, Ireland and the Irish in Interwar England , was named a 2014 "Book of the Year" by History Today and was the runner-up for the Royal History Society's 2015 Whitfield Prize for first book in British or Irish history. Moulton regularly writes for outlets such as The Atlantic , Public Books , Disclaimer Magazine , and the Toast. They live in London, UK.

Reviews (2)

Kirkus Review

A group portrait of a celebrated crime writer and her Oxford friends.When Dorothy L. Sayers (1893-1957) arrived at Somerville College in 1912, women were second-class citizens, able to take classes but not earn degrees. Undaunted, the future novelist and other female students read their works in progress aloudwith "no false modesty or feminine shame"at meetings of a group that Sayers dubbed the Mutual Admiration Society. In this well-researched group biography, Moulton (History/Univ. of Birmingham; Ireland and the Irish in Interwar England, 2014) follows four pillars of the "society" as they challenged stereotypes of women throughout their lives: Muriel St. Clare Byrne, a distinguished historian and playwright; Charis Barnett Frankenburg, a birth control pioneer who wrote popular child-rearing manuals; Dorothea Hanbury Rowe, the co-founder of an influential amateur theater company; and Sayers, the author of the Lord Peter Wimsey detective stories. Dividing its focus among the women, the book shows how they helped one another as friends, intellectual sounding boards, and, in the case of Sayers and Byrne, collaborators on the play Busman's Honeymoon. The drawback to this approach is that Sayers was the star from the start, and a surfeit of prosaic details about her friends and their outliers makes for a slow-paced story, further encumbered with redundancies (most Wimsey novels are "enduring classics"), retrofitted jargon (the women risked "marginality within the gender politics of their era"), and unedifying exposition (Frankenburg found it "enormously stressful" to have three sons in uniform in World War II). Still, Moulton offers telling glimpses of Sayers, whether she's making a daring plan to hide her son born out of wedlock or exulting when her agent sells Whose Body? to Boni Liveright: "I am rich! I am famous!" Moulton also has a firm answer to the question of who inspired Lord Peter: "The early Wimsey is, above all, an idealized version of DLS herself, with bits and pieces of her experiences and her fantasies woven in to make a genuinely fictional character."Lord Peter Wimsey's creator upstages her companions as they blaze trails for women. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Booklist Review

Historian Moulton examines the web of interconnection, support, and critique among mystery author Dorothy Sayers and her Oxford classmates. Though Sayers remains the best-known of the group dubbed the Mutual Admiration Society, its other members included Dorothy Rowe, a pioneer of amateur theater; Charis Frankenburg, a philanthropist, birth control advocate, and child-rearing expert; and Muriel St. Clare Byrne, a playwright and historian of everyday life in Elizabethan England. Each receives her due in this engrossing group biography, as Moulton mines letters, diaries, interviews, and published works to reveal the collaborations that aided Sayers and her friends in their professional growth throughout their lives. Without glossing over moral failures like racism or anti-Semitism, Moulton celebrates the efforts of her subjects to shape their changing world in ways that would offer women themselves included a wider range of creative, intellectual, and social possibilities. Whether sending condolences for lost loved ones, money for medical bills, or stringent critiques of the newest creative endeavor, Sayers and her friends were staunch and lifelong friends to each other. Moulton, with a keen eye for humorous detail and moments of humanity, deftly captures not only the lives of these women, but the enduring power of female friendship.--Jenny Hamilton Copyright 2019 Booklist

Main Characters	p. ix
Introduction	p. 1
Part I Oxford, 1912-1918
1 Arriving At Oxford	p. 11
2 Mutual Admiration Society On Stage And Page	p. 25
3 University Passions	p. 41
4 Battlefronts	p. 51
Part 2 Slough Of Despond, 1918-1929
5 Teach Or Marry?	p. 69
6 Detection And Despair	p. 83
7 Professional Motherhood	p. 107
8 Sleepless Nights	p. 131
Part 3 Head And Heart, 1929-1939
9 Departures And Reunions	p. 145
10 Subversive Spinster	p. 159
11 The Problem Of Marriage	p. 169
12 Does It Please You?	p. 185
13 What The Busman Wrought	p. 201
Part 4 Visions of a New World, 1939-1945
14 War Breaks Out	p. 215
15 Service And Identity	p. 225
16 The Greengate Hospital	p. 237
17 Running To Stand Still	p. 247
18 Bridgeheads To The Future	p. 255
Part 5 Masterworks and Legacies, 1946-1988
19 Friendships And Triumphs	p. 275
20 Legacies	p. 287
Conclusion	p. 293
Acknowledgments	p. 297
Notes	p. 299
Bibliography	p. 345
Index	p. 357

Available:*

Bound With These Titles

On Order

Summary

Summary

Author Notes

Reviews (2)

Kirkus Review

Booklist Review

Table of Contents