All hail the spinster
This article from the Guardian UK is about the long and wonderful history of independent ladies of a certain age in fiction. The happy spinsters, spry widows, lean governesses and ladies of an altogether more supernatural persuasion.
These women are not always glamorous, nor beautiful, nor entertainingly witty. They are not always morally good. But they have something which is usually a given for males in film and books: they have charisma, power and independence. They are no one’s helpmeet, and this gives them the space to influence their own storylines, for good or ill. They are middle-aged women with minds of their own.
This type of character, which seems so miraculous in fiction, is absolutely common in daily life. I wonder, though, if these dames will ever get their real due, away from the pages of a novel or the archetypes of folklore. Miss Pettigrew was written by a women, about women and published beautifully by Persephone Books who are dedicated to the history of women’s writing. The novel has been eaten up by the Hollywood machine and spat out with a male club pulling all the strings: the director is Bharat Nalluri and the writers are David Magee and Simon Beaufoy. Ultimately, the only female magnificence in this project is the delightful illusion in front of the cameras, far away from the real power.
