Anna and Thomas Haslam were born in the decade before Victoria ascended to the throne, both into Quaker families. The ethos of Quakerism was evident in all aspects of their lives. The couple married in 1854 and lived well into the twentieth century. This book is both an exploration of their lives and a history of the first forty years of feminist activism in Ireland. Thomas, an example of a Victorian polymath, wrote on birth control as early as 1868 and, in the 1870s, on prostitution and on sexual morality. He published a journal on female suffrage in 1874 and continued to write on the subject until his death in 1917 at the age of 92. Genteel Revolutionaries traces the Haslams' work for women's suffrage from their founding of the Dublin Women's Suffrage Association in 1876 to the granting of the franchise in 1918. It looks at the campaign for the repeal of the Contagious Diseases Acts in the 1870s, a campaign regarded at the time as disgraceful because 'ladies' discussed prostitution and venereal disease, subjects they should have known nothing about. Anna was active in the movement for the education of women and was also instrumental in winning for women the right to stand as candidates in local elections. She was a member of the International Council of Women from the 1880s. The Haslams corresponded with leading English intellectuals, including John Stuart Mill, and with activists such as Marie Stopes. Genteel Revolutionaries explores a world in which a coterie of like-minded people strove for reform in a law-abiding manner. It reveals an Ireland where people with religious and political differences worked together for a common cause and whose conservative demeanor belied their radical ideals.

About the Author
Carmel Quinlan is a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow in the Department of History, University College Cork where she is also co-ordinator of the MA course in Women's Studies

Reviews
This is not just a book about the struggle for women's voting rights in Ireland. Quinlan is certainly limited by archival material, but she has good scholarly habits, a clear writing style, a sensitivity to the larger issues in which the Haslams found themselves, and a talent for chronicling their efforts to change the wider Irish society's treatment of women within a very long period--from the Victorian era well into the 20th century. We get a glimpse of the younger Haslams as they embark on careers as social activists; we see their interaction with leading figures such as John Stuart Mill and Marie Stopes; and we get to see the older Haslams as they face a changing Ireland, complicated political issues (such as the Home Rule struggle), and growing aggressive tactics of a new generation of women who are also eager for equality, but less inhibited about how to achieve it. We also learn how the strength of a Quaker upbringing carried this couple through interesting times. Quaker Books for Friends (Vol. 5, No. 1) This is a fascinating and valuable acocunt of the lives of Anna and Thomas Haslam, activists on birth control, the repeal of the Contagious Diseases Acts,and votes for women. It also provides a unique insight into Irish life in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and into the particularly Irish version of victorian culture that dominated at the time. The book begins with a lovely image of Anna casting her vote for the first time at age 90, in 1918; at the birth of the new Ireland, and at the end of her life. She and her husband had lived through famine, fenianism, land wards, home rule, world war and the 1916 rising. While the book is a sort of love story about their marriage, it covers far more than their lives together, and documents the often neglected story of the origins of the movements for birth control and women's rights in Ireland. The Haslams, in their moderation, the quiet certainty with which they pursued their politics, their willingness to work with others of opposing political persuasions, were truly revolutionary and we can now see in many ways ahead of their time. Their story has much to tell us, not just about our history, but about where we are today. Ivana Bacik Reid Chair of Criminal Law, Criminology and Penology Trinty College Dublin



Book Information
ISBN 9781859183946
Author Carmel Quinlan
Format Paperback
Page Count 280
Imprint Cork University Press
Publisher Cork University Press