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Jayna E. Palumbo

Dr. Carr

ENGLIT 1175-1000

12 December 2021

Money, Status, Sex in Keynotes

Keynotes by George Egerton, composed of short stories from the 19th century, ranges

many desires during this time period. In this novella, readers will explore how women are

presented, men use their money as a way to degrade and enable women, relevance to sexual

politics in the 19th Century, and a comparison to George Eliot’s Middlemarch.

Before critiquing the literature, it is important to understand the author of Keynotes as a

way to understand the reading as a whole. Mary Chavelita Dunne Bright, writing under the pen

name George Egerton, was known for her writing works as being called ‘new women’ fiction

(Charlton). As many questions about women’s suffrage and rights begin to enter the 19th century,

this type of fiction became all the rage. However, it is reported that “The public's taste for ‘new

woman’ fiction, which examined gender roles and issues of sexuality, declined after the trial

of Oscar Wilde in 1895, and her audience disappeared. The popular demand for short stories also

fell, and, with no further novels after 1898,” (Charlton) Egerton was quick, yet, very impactful

for how readers access 19th century literature in a feministic lens.

In Keynotes, how are women presented? There is an interesting presentation of women in

the short story An Empty Frame. The initial perspective of the nameless woman is sexual, the

narrator describes her as “her fingers glide swiftly down the buttons of her gown; in a second she

has freed herself from its ensheathing, garment after garment falls from her until she stands

almost free," (Egerton 116). This description is erotic and sexual, describing how she takes off

her clothes and let her body be free. This can be described as a male gaze, being overtly sexual
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and an emphasis on the body. However, this gaze switches where the woman is described as “he

double furrow between her clever irregular eyebrows. Her face is more characteristic than

beautiful... The eyes tell you little; they are keen and inquiring, and probe other's thoughts rather

than reveal their own. The whole face is one of peculiar strength and self-reliance. The mouth its

contradiction,” (Egerton 117). Here, readers see less of an emphasis on the body as the woman

being a sexual being, however, looking at the different body parts and personality that makes her

beautiful as a whole. This is seen as a female gaze, less emphasis on the sexual parts of a woman,

and more emphasis on the body as whole which what makes her beautiful. Another example of

this can be found in the short story A Shadow’s Slant, the unnamed woman talked to the Romani

girl, the first gaze of each other was described as “The girl looks curiously, pityingly,

respectfully at the other girl, she is a little more than a girl as she stands dumbly by during all

this scene. Eye seeks eye-sympathy meets sympathy-what affinity is between two creatures?”

(Egerton 147-148). This gaze is playful and curious-feminine-rather than overtly sexual-

masculine. So, why is this feminine gaze so important? It leads back to the initial point of the

presentation of woman. This ‘new woman’ fiction Egerton is writing for takes a focus off woman

sexuality rather valuing woman as a whole. Women become complex and intelligent beings in

Egerton’s writing rather than just a body to men.

In continuation with gender, it is vital to note how men are perceived in the short stories

alongside women. The men ‘woo’ women with their riches where an example of this can be

found in the story named A Cross Line. Between the lustful exchange of the unnamed woman

and the fisherman, the woman desires great things in her life that her husband cannot give her.

The fisherman tells her “‘Do you think I don’t know it? I can’t for the life of me think how you,

with that free gipsy nature of yours, could bind yourself to a monotonous country life, with no
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excitement, no change. I wish I could offer you my yacht. Do you like the see’” (Egerton 26).

The fisherman begins with critiquing the woman’s lifestyle while trying to impress her with his

boat. The boat, being a luxury time, is a symbol of the fisherman’s wealth. He enables her to

believe she will have a better, stable life with him rather than what her husband gives the

woman. She assumingly falls for his ‘wooing’, as she leaves the sheet on the lilac bush for the

fisherman to notice. Another example of woman idolizing men’s wealth as a way to impress can

be found in the story “A Little Grey Glove”. The narrator, an awkward male, initially describes

himself as “I fell in for a legacy, the forerunner of several; indeed, I may say I am beastly rich,”

(Egerton 92). This being one of the first interpretations of the male protagonist gives a sense of a

strong ego along with equating his personhood to money. However, readers must retreat back a

few sentences where the man describes an incident saying “I was madly in love with her,

seriously intent on lawful wedlock. Luckily for me she threw me over for a neighboring pork

butcher, but at the time I took it hardly, and it made me sex-shy. I was a very poor man in those

days,” (Egerton 91). As the story continues, the narrator describes his interaction with women as

“It was after the legacy that women discovered my attractions. They found that there was

something superb in my plainness (before, they said ugliness), something after the style of the

late Victor Emanuel, something infinitely more striking than mere ordinary beauty,” (Egerton

92). Readers see two perspectives of the man, when he was poor, he was considered ugly, sex-

shy, awkward versus once he receives his fortune and becomes wealthy he is seen as more

attractive and decent. So, the man found a new confidence once he receives the money, why is

this? It is a manipulation tactic that has been running through the patriarchy for years, men

become confident in their wealth status and since women at the time needed men’s wealth to
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support them, they become blindsided by the male’s wealth. This can be used as leverage to

manipulate woman.

Continuing, how can one take these two topics and relate it to sexual politics of the 19th

century. To define sexual politics, Collins Dictionary explains it is “the differences in the amount

of power that male and female people have in a society or group” (Collins Dictionary). So, 19th

century sexual politics was more often seen to be, men were the providers and women were

submissive, men were the money makers, women were the home makers. Kathryn Hughes

explains the marriage between men and woman as:

“Girls usually married in their early to mid-20s. Typically, the groom would be five years older.

Not only did this reinforce the ‘natural’ hierarchy between the sexes, but it also made sound

financial sense. A young man needed to be able to show that he earned enough money to support

a wife and any future children before the girl’s father would give his permission. Some

unfortunate couples were obliged to endure an engagement lasting decades before they could

afford to marry. If a young man was particularly pious he might manage to stay chaste until he

married,” (Hughes)

Like Hughes said, men’s wealth status is important in a heterosexual relationship during this

time period. So, it is reasonable for men to flaunt their money like readers see repeatedly in

Keynotes. Flaunting money was a one-way ticket to receive a blessing for a marriage. So where

is the connection to the female gaze Egerton establishes? With understanding that women are not

sexual beings, looking pretty and submissive to their husbands, that Egerton describes the female

characters as more than beautiful, they are pure-hearted, witty, and more than their feminine

features. The female gaze gives dynamics to women, something readers may not see in a male

writer of the 19th century.

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Finally, how do readers connect Keynotes and George Eliot’s Middlemarch in the means

of sexual politics? It is important to note what were the intentions for marriage in Middlemarch.

With the main character, Dorothea, it is important to note her marriages within the novel,

particularly with Edward Casaubon. Casaubon is a particularly weird man, his main focus in his

life research of The Key of All Mythologies. He even works on his research during his

honeymoon in Italy with Dorothea. Mrs. Cadwallader, a friend to the Brooke’s, explains about

Casaubon that “’Somebody put a drop [of Casaubon’s blood] under a magnifying-glass, and it

was all semicolons and paratheses,” (Eliot 71). Why is Dorothea attracted to this? One reason: to

grow her education and knowledge. As stated prior, Dorothea is not much worried about luxury

and riches like her sister and other women during this time period, she is looking for someone to

be her educational mentor, Casaubon being the perfect fit. The narrator explains “Into this soul-

hunger as yet all her [Dorothea’s] youthful passion was poured; the union which attracted her

was one that would deliver her girlish subjection to her own ignorance, and give her the freedom

of voluntary submission to a guide who would take her along the grandest path” (Eliot 29).

Dorothea’s purpose for courting with Casaubon is to be a submissive student for him and to

further her own education, not out of love. On the flip end in Keynotes, readers see a different

perspective of the male side of marriage, it is an intention for money and status growth,

especially seen in the short story A Cross Line where the fisherman wants to promise a woman a

better life than a nomadic life. These books balance and challenge both sides of the realm of

sexual politics in this time period. Eliot places aim on woman changing and defying the means of

marriage while Egerton places strong emphasis on male’s intention in marriage.

In conclusion, George Egerton in her novella, Keynotes, breaks into the male psyche of

marriages during the 19th century. Whereas, readers will explore how women are presented, men
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use their money as a way to degrade and enable women, relevance to sexual politics in the 19th

Century.
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Works Cited

Egerton, George. Keynotes. Elkin Mathews & John Lane, 1893, HathiTrust Digital Library,

https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uc2.ark:/13960/t1sf2q892&view=1up&seq=3&skin=

2021. 

Eliot, George. Middlemarch. Penguin Classics, 1994.

Hughes, Kathryn. “Gender Roles in the 19th Century .” The British Library, 15 May 2014,

https://www.bl.uk/romantics-and-victorians/articles/gender-roles-in-the-19th-

century#authorBlock1. 

“Sexual Politics in British English.” Collins English Dictionary, 2021,

https://www.collinsdictionary.com/us/dictionary/english/sexual-politics.