In
1911 Dora Marsden and Mary
Gawthorpe established
the feminist journal,
The Freewoman.
The journal caused a storm when it advocated free love and encouraged
women not to get married. The journal also included articles
that suggested communal childcare and co-operative housekeeping.
Mary
Gawthorpe had
suffered severe internal injuries after being beaten up by stewards
at a meeting. She was also imprisoned several times and hunger strikes
and force-feeding badly damaged her health and in May
1912, she was unable to continue working as co-editor of The
Freewoman.
Dora
Marsden continued publishing the magazine on her own but the original
backer withdrew after it was banned by W. H. Smith for immorality.
Harriet Shaw Weaver agreed to give the magazine financial support
and it was relaunched as the New Freewoman.
Rebecca
West now became
involved in publishing the magazine and in 1914 was renamed The
Egoist: An Individualist Review. Marsden
resigned as editor of the magazine and decided to concentrate on writing
books.
Harriet Shaw Weaver now
became editor and began to publish the work of the poets Ezra
Pound, Richard
Aldington and
T.
S. Eliot.
In 1914 and 1915 the journal serialized A
Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James
Joyce. The
Egoist ceased publication in 1919.
Last updated: 12th August, 2002
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