She would go to the doctor, read women’s magazines, peruse advertisements and become fluent in the finer points of etiquette, all with the goal of making herself presentable to the opposite sex. These matters - such as hygiene, beauty and relationships - would dominate a well-heeled woman’s pre- and post-marital life. Oneill has good reason for placing her reader in the company of the upper crust unlike her less fortunate peers, a lady of status would have time to think about matters beyond survival. Oneill is an eager tour guide: “You’ll arrive in the 19th century in the guise of a young woman of some wealth, European descent and living in either America or Western Europe,” she writes.
To clean herself up, she used old newspapers, leaves or corncobs. But then, curiosity got the better of her, and she found herself wondering: How did women use the bathroom in those things? And did the Victorians have toilet paper? The result of her research is “Unmentionable: The Victorian Lady’s Guide to Sex, Marriage, and Manners.”Īs Oneill writes, it was a time when even the most elegant lady wore crotchless undergarments so she could easily squat over a bedpan without having to lift up pounds upon pounds of clothing. It’s been given so much Hollywood gilding in films such as “The Portrait of a Lady” and “The Age of Innocence,” depicting it as a time of great civility, manners and grace.Īuthor and pop historian Therese Oneill once dreamed about life as an aristocrat of the Victorian age, stepping into a hoop skirt and gliding across a ballroom. It’s easy to romanticize the past, especially the Victorian era.
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