"A Being breathing thoughtful breath,
A Traveller between life and death;
The reason firm, the temperate will,
Endurance, foresight, strength, and skill;
A perfect Woman, nobly planned,
To warn, to comfort, and command;
And yet a Spirit still, and bright
With something of angelic light. "

Wordsworth "She Was a Phantom of Delight"

The perfect woman is a phantom. Every man is looking for one, but each has his own specifications . Unfortunately, should he be lucky enough to find his ideal, he can then feel either emasculated and intimidated by the goddess, or exasperated with the vapid doll. Just as well most men end up with a lesser mortal who they can live with in harmony, with each of us being the best they can ourselves, but neither of us expecting too much of our partner.

What an inaccurate and poor depiction of Lizzie Siddal. Yes she was beautiful and she was taken from her job in a hat shop and introduced to the world of the Pre-Raphaelites, but to imply that she was cast out from society and was purely the victim of the actions of men is to so underrate her. She was an artist and poet in her own right and she was fully aware and committed to the aims of the Pre-Raphaelites. Yes she was tragic, yes she died tragically, yes she was not honoured for her work in her lifetime, but the same can be said of many male artists. I recommend this on the Pre-Raphaelite sisterhood. preraphaelitesisterhood.com/elizabeth-siddal-laying-the-ghost-to-rest/
By accepting this view of her we are perpetuating the idea that was promoted after her death that women have no value as artists.

There's a paradox in the ideal of perfection, in that the truly wise woman knows that trying to live up to other people's expectations - whether it's the perfert body, the perfect career, the perfect home, is a wasted effort that will lead only to unhappiness.

'God give me the strength to change the things I can
The grace to accept the things I cannot
And the wisdom to know the difference'

You don't have to be religious to appreciate that prayer.

The pressures on young women come from different sources these days. Celeb culture rather than the husband at home. But you just can't really compare it with those times. Women have far more life chances nowadays.

I always expect these blogs to be something to do with the subject of the book being promoted. It always comes as a surprise when it invariably isn't!

The picture of the perfect Victorian women is drawn by men and has nothing to do with what women were actually like.

I enjoy reading 19th century novels especially those that reflect the contemporary scene. Trollope, Oliphant, the Findlaters. The first on the list is male, the other two are female. Trollope's females do tend to fit the male 19th century stereotype, but when you read the novels of Mrs Oliphant, an unjustly neglected author, you have a whole series of heroines; young, vibrant, attractive and generally achieving their goals in life, including marriages that are clearly based on equality.

If you read almost any book that has come from the Virago press over the last 30 years plus, most of them the works of unjustly neglected 19th and early 20th century women novelist you consistently see a far more realistic picture of what contemporary women were really like. We are in danger here of buying into a modern political correct view of 19th century patriarchy and ignoring all the evidence that stacks up against practice versus theory.

However it should also be remembered that not all 19th century males bought into the stereotype. This is Alfred, Lord Tennyson's description of the eponymous Maud. Hardly a man enamoured of the stereotype

^Perfectly beautiful: let it be granted her: where is the fault?
All that I saw (for her eyes were downcast, not to be seen)
Faultily faultless, icily regular, splendidly null,
Dead perfection, no more.^

And the Elizabeth Gaskell books. Long time since I read them, but I don't think her women fitted the stereotype.

Absolutely! I cannot think how I forgot her.

Correction: I meant 'against theory versus practice', not the other way again.

I can see the analogy between then and now, you have only to look at the young women that you see around you now to see that despite all the obsession with celebrities and perfection and some girls falling for the code of perfection the vast majority clearly ignore them all. We wouldn't have a problem of young women and obesity if they all bought into the celebrity culture.

We shouldn't believe what the media say about the presentation of women.The media is still predominantly male and there is a vast gap between what they want and women are.

I was just about to mention Elizabeth Gaskell too jingle. I love her women in Cranford especially. They are so well drawn. The 'gentil economies' always amuse me; eating plain bread and butter because it is more wholesome and walking home, because the starry nights are so beautiful. Certainly not Angels of the Hearth!

Mollie in Wives and Daughters and Margaret in North and South are, again, anything but Angels of the Hearth and both women are admired by their future husbands for their qualities of independence and self decision

As I said I think too many modern researchers are so keen to prove how oppressed women were in the 19th century they choose, judiciously, to ignore the, arguably, more accurate, picture of women found in the works by women authors - and there were a lot of them and many were prolific.

We can add to Mrs Gaskell and Mrs Oliphant, the Brontes and Mary Anne Evans. who may have published under male pen names but do the Brontes themselves and their heroines and George Elliot in her books and in her life support the picture of women as Angels of the Hearth?

Someone should do a study of how modern women are represented in modern literature written by men and women. I think there would still be a gender difference in the way women are represented

I think the fact that The Angel of the Hearth was a male construct can't be disputed, but the two examples given of Dickens and Lizzie Siddal are so wrong. Dickens for example moved his wife out and brought in her sister to run the household. His mistress Ellen Tiernan was in fact a deep dark secret unknown to the public.
There are two views of the Lizzie Siddal painting, one says that she was cowed by Millais and daren't say she was too cold. The other says that she was aware of what was wanted and stayed in the cold water to make sure that the image of Ophelia was as real as possible.

I suspect that an artist's model, male or female, would still be prepared to undergo a certain amount of discomfort for the artist to get his painting right.

I cannot quote publication and date but I am sure I have read interviews with modern artist's models who have talked about the discomfort they have sometimes suffered to enable an artist to have them in the right pose and long enough for the artist to finish their work.