Wonder Of Women - Suicide Stories: Celebrate the true pioneers of female literature

In the days when Britain ruled the waves and bestrode the world as its policeman and plunderer in chief it also subjugated half of its own people to second class status. Women were chattel and property. There were some exceptions based on wealth and birthright but for the overwhelming majority your lot was to fall in with the rules and do as you were told. Many did.

But whilst male society sought to place obstacles in the path to equality, it could not deny their literary talents, which many times they circumvented by using male pseudonyms. However, the soaring sales of magazines and periodicals during the Victorian Age meant they had voracious appetites for literature, whatever the sex of its gender.

Dozens of authors appeared to fill the need. Narratives had new ideas. Characters were emboldened by societal changes and the female voice taking responsibility.

The women included here are talents that dazzle. Put them up against anyone and they rise to the top. Whether they remain with an avid readership today or faded to obscurity with the passing of the times their quality remains undimmed.

1 - Women of Wonder - Suicide - An Introduction

2 - The Legacy by Virginia Woolf

3 - The Voyage by Katherine Mansfield

4 - Paul's Case by Willa Cather

5 - Cohen of Trinity by Amy Levy

6 - The Mourner by Mary Shelley

7 - The Quadroons by Lydia Maria Child

8 - An Outcast of the People by Bithia Mary Croker

9 - Blessed Are the Meek by Mary Webb

10 - When Spirits Steal by Philippa Forest

11 - The Cold Embrace by Mary Elizabeth Braddon

12 - The Oculist by Catherine Wells

13 - Sokratics in the Strand by Amy Levy