Of course, in 1920 as in 1908, these men (and one woman) 16 were found wanting:
The House of Commons took the matter up. The Plumage Bill was sent to Standing Committee C. With one exception [Lady Astor] each of its sixty-seven members was a man. And on five occasions it was impossible to get a quorum of twenty to attend. The Plumage Bill is for all practical purposes dead. But what do men care? Look wherever you like this morning! (243)
On Woolf ’ s July morning in 1920, egret plumes were still arranged for sale on Regent Street, and Lady So-and-So, with cash in hand and the power/freedom said cash delivers, had every right to buy the beautiful, complementary accessory for her opera ensemble — an accessory deemed by the fashion press to be worthy of both Lady So-and-So and the occasion: “ Lady So-and-So was ‘ looking lovely with a lemon-coloured egret in her hair. ’ ” After all, Lady So-and-So “ of the stupid face and beautiful figure is going tonight to the opera; Clara Butt is singing Orpheus; Princess Mary will be present ” (242). After all, an egret plume was something even a princess, because of her grandmother ’ s own anti-plumage vow, could not wear. 17
Woolf s attack on the overt misogyny of Massingham ’ s comments on “ child-bearing ” women begins with anger, with a “ sex antagonism ” that would shatter these patriarchal institutions as swiftly as protesting suffragettes broke every shop window on Regent Street at four in the afternoon on 1 March 1912 (Adburgham, 176 – 77). Or, is it that intense? The reader will recall that Woolf, as a woman artist caught in the production/consumption binds of art and without the weapons — money and time — needed to combat patriarchal strictures, “ soft pedals ” her act of defiance against Massingham ’ s anti-plumage misogyny with the conditional “ if ” ( “ If I had the money and the time . . . ” ). At the end of the essay, this “ sex antagonism ” has been diffused even more by the laughter of parody. In turning Massingham ’ s words upside down, Woolf attempts with hyperbole to smooth down any potentially ruffled feathers in her audience:
The Plumage Bill is for all practical purposes dead. But what do men care? Look wherever you like this morning! Still, one cannot imagine “ Wayfarer ” putting it like that. “ They have to be shot for child-begetting men to flaunt the symbols of it. . . . But what do men care? Look at Regent Street this morning! ” Such an outburst about a fishing-rod would be deemed sentimental in the extreme. Yet I suppose that salmon have their feelings. (243)
Woolf ’ s “ earliest feminist polemic ” posed a special problem for Woolf: balancing her own anti-plumage position with controlled outrage at Massingham (see note 1) and Massingham ’ s misogyny. In the face of Massingham ’ s statements, Woolf had no recourse but to the “ perfect ” act of rhetorical defiance: “ If I had the money and the time I should . . . go to Regent Street, [and] buy an egret plume. ” Well, it was almost perfect. The controversy sparked by Woolf ’ s essay — Massingham ’ s and Mrs. Meta Bradley ’ s ( “ Does it matter in the least to the birds so foully slain whether the blame rests most with men or women? ” ) replies of 30 July 1920 to The Woman ’ s Leader and Woolf ’ s 6 August 1920 response to both Massingham and Bradley (Woolf, “ Letter to the Editor, ” 244 – 45, n.4) — highlighted the intense involvement of women in the anti-plumage campaign, the potential for conflict when women ’ s rights conflicted with other agendas (vegetarianism, animals rights, conservationism), 18 and Woolf ’ s own identity as an artist. As a maturing producer of essays who strove for a polemical tone without stridency, Woolf could miss her mark or be misunderstood.
Woolf found that the production/consumption equation is just not so simple for the female writer. Earlier, Woolf ’ s anxiety about her own productions and their reception by consumers prompted her relapse into madness after the completion of The Voyage Out (Bell, Virginia Woolf, 2:11 – 7). This anxiety was later validated in Woolf ’ s mind by certain unfavorable critical responses, including Massingham ’ s (see note 1), to her next novel, Night and Day (Bell, Virginia Woolf, 2:69), 19 and no doubt also by the controversy in The Woman ’ s Leader over “ The Plumage Bill. ” However, in “ The Plumage Bill, ” the woman as artist is not a writer but a singer: Dame Clara Butt (1872 – 1936) who “ sings ” the lead role in Christoph Willibald Gluck ’ s (1714 – 1787) Orfeo ed Euridice (1762) at Lady So-and-So ’ s “ visit ” to the opera (242). 20 The irony in Woolf ’ s reference to Dame Butt lies in the public portrayal of a male Greek hero by a woman; moreover, it is a role that depicts male sorrow and frailty, originally written for a castrated male (more irony) voice. This irony runs even deeper, for the Greek language and its literature were a male-dominated cultural preserve, a preserve invaded by Woolf in private Greek tutorials with Janet Case (see note 1) and through her friendship with the classicist and vegetarian Jane Harrison (see note 8). The language became for Woolf an ideal means of expression ( “ The Perfect Language ” [1917], Essays, 2:114 – 19), and, later, in her madness, Woolf heard the birds singing in Greek. The same Woolf probably apprehended the appropriateness of such a manifestation as the myth tells that the “ real ” Orpheus taught Greek to the birds. Birds do not sing in Woolf ’ s “ perfect language. ” While Woolf did not see herself writing “ as a bird, ” she did write as a “ champion of birds. ” Thus, Woolf ’ s career as a polemicist began with an attempt at anti-plumage rhetoric. As such, “ The Plumage Bill ” produced controversy, but its merger of anti-plumage argument with “ an outburst of sex antagonism ” stands as the first feminist statement of the early twentieth century ’ s most eloquent and influential “ champion of women. ”
* * *
Notes
1. Henry William Massingham was editor of The Nation from 1907 until his resignation in 1923. Virginia Woolf ’ s relationship with Massingham could best be characterized as strained and unstable. As "Wayfarer," Massingham published an unflattering paragraph on Woolf ’ s second novel Night and Day (1919) on 29 November 1919 in which he described Woolf ’ s characters as "Four Impassioned Snails" ( Diary, 1:316, n.2; 318). Woolf refers to this "cutting paragraph" ( Diary 1:316) several times in her letters ( Letters, 2:399 – 400, 405, 515), but was reconciled to Massingham when he twice offered (5 May 1920) her husband Leonard Woolf (1880 – 1969) a job at The Nation ( Diary, 2:34, n.3; 42), and even more so when The Nation published a flattering review (15 May 1920) by Robert Lynd (1879 – 1949) on Night and Day ( Diary, 2:38, n.14). Conflict was renewed, however, with Massingham ’ s attack on Woolf ’ s "The Plumage Bill" (23 July 1920) in his letter to the editor in The Woman ’ s Leader (30 July 1920). Woolf responded: "I ’ ve a vendetta with Massingham, against whom my arrow was launched" ( Diary, 2:58). The "arrow" was Woolf ’ s reply to Massingham ( The Woman ’ s Leader, 6 August 1920). The following year (21 February 1921), Woolf was to score another point in the "vendetta" by declining Massingham ’ s request to review Dorothy Richardson ’ s (1873 – 1957) 1921 novel Deadlock ( Diary, 2:93). All was well again by the end of the following year (13 November 1922) when Woolf again "forgave" Massingham after reading Massinghams public praise ( The Nation & Athenaeum, 22 October 1922) of Leonard Woolf: "I like this, & forgive Massingham his abuse of me from this time forward" ( Diary, 2:212). However, Woolf could not forget, at least not in a letter (20 March 1922) to her former Greek tutor and suffragist sponsor Janet Case (1862 – 1937): "Massingham says L[eonard] is the best writer on the Nation: But what did Massingham say of Night and Day?" ( Letters, 2:515). Woolf ’ s complex relationship with Massingham invites a psychological reading of "The Plumage Bill" as it relates to Woolf ’ s rage at patriarchal critique, to her dealings with literary "father" figures (Massingham), to her relationship with Leonard Woolf, to Woolf ’ s delusions during her 1904 breakdown, and to additional "bird hysteria" before Woolf ’ s 1915 breakdown as recorded in a letter to Lytton Strachey (1880 – 1932) ( Letters, 2:61; see note 17 below) — a letter that Nigel Nicolson characterizes as "malicious beyond the point of sanity" (xvi). (Note: Throughout the second volume of Woolf ’ s letters, H. W. Massin
gham is misidentified as H. J. Massingham [1888 – 1952], H. W. Massingham ’ s son and a noted naturalist in his own right.)
2. Robin W. Doughty describes William H. Hudson (1841 – 1922) as a "noted naturalist and author, [who] allied himself with the infant SPB [Society for the Protection of Birds] by contributing to its leaflet program, which alerted the public to the potential disaster to birds from feather fashions" (53, n.5). Woolf reviewed Hudson ’ s Far Away and Long Ago: A History of My Early Life (1918) ("Mr. Hudson ’ s Childhood," Essays, 2:298 – 303) and was particularly captivated by Hudson ’ s descriptions of birds: "These are the birds of earliest childhood, and from them his [Hudson ’ s] dreams spring and by them his images are coloured in later life. Riding at first seemed to him like flying. When he is first among a crowd of well-dressed people in Buenos Aires he compares them at once to a flock of military starlings. From watching birds comes his lifelong desire to fly — but it is a desire which no airship or balloon but the wings of a bird alone will satisfy" (301).
3. "Osprey," "egret," and "aigrette" were generally interchangeable terms during the Victorian, Edwardian, and Georgian eras. An "aigrette" may not necessarily be made of "egret" plumes, but "osprey" plumes are the same as "egret" plumes — tall, slim, stately feathers that are white in their natural state. In other words, "osprey" feathers and "egret" feathers are from the same species of heron. The osprey, however, is a brown, fish-eating hawk not used in millinery. "Aigrettes" were generally made of "egret" feathers since the principle behind an aigrette is to wear a tall, slim, stately feather(s)on the head as part of a jewel or headpiece, or actually in the hair. Obviously, "aigrette" is derived from "egret."
Woolf herself was confused about the distinction, or lack of distinction, between "osprey" and "egret": "At the age of ten or thereabouts I signed a pledge never to wear one of the condemned feathers [egret], and have kept the vow so implicitly that I cannot distinguish osprey from egret" ( Essays, 3:244, n.4). Another "feather controversy" of Woolf ’ s era involved white feathers. During World War I, pro-war women branded men in civilian dress as cowards by handing them white feathers — an ironic gesture given that most plumage valued in millinery is produced by the male bird as a year-round sex indicator and/or for display during breeding season. In Three Guineas, Woolf condemned both the "white feather of cowardice" and public praise of wartime bravery, which Woolf symbolized in a reference to the French Legion of Honor as the "red feather of courage" (109).
On the subject of herons, the reader familiar with American literature may recall Sarah Orne Jewett ’ s (1849 – 1909) short story "A White Heron" (1886) and Louis A. Renza ’ s exhaustive study of this one short story — "A White Heron" and the Question of Minor Literature. Renza does mention the plumage issue, but dismisses it as not relevant to Jewett ’ s story (127). However, Deborah Strom, in Birdwatching with American Women: A Selection of Nature Writings, does connect Jewett ’ s story to the conservation movement (114). (My gratitude to the editors for pointing out Strom ’ s comments.)
4. I refer, of course, to the essays themselves as they were published in Woolf ’ s time and not to the revelatory endnotes provided by Andrew McNeillie to Woolf ’ s letters, diaries, and other writings, which more often than not reveal Woolf ’ s true feelings, always witty, often condemning, about her subjects. It should be noted that "The Plumage Bill" was reproduced earlier as Appendix 2 in the second volume (1920 – 1924) of Woolf ’ s diary (337 – 38). It should also be noted that Woolf ’ s letters (9 and 16 October 1920) to Sir Desmond McCarthy (1877 – 1952) in his position as literary editor of The New Statesman (collectively entitled "The Intellectual Status of Women") are generally regarded as Woolf ’ s first feminist polemic. "The Intellectual Status of Women" is also reproduced in the second volume of the diary in Appendix 3 (339 – 40).
5. An attempt will be made. For Great Britain, laws pertaining to bird protection and plumage can be divided into two groups: native birds and nonnative birds. Native birds were protected under law by the Sea Birds Preservation Act of 1869, which was expanded in 1880. The Wild Birds Protection Act of 1887 regulated birds in India. The export of wild birds for millinery purposes was banned in British India in 1902. The first Plumage Bill to ban all exotic imports was proposed in 1908.
Doughty provides a chart of legislative efforts regarding plumage legislation from 1903 to the successful passage of the 1921 Plumage Act, implemented 1 April 1922 (118 – 20). The reader must also note the many, many distinctions made in all plumage discussions of the era. There were good (insect-eating) birds and bad (crop-eating or barnyard fowl – eating) birds, wild birds and ranched birds, and regional/cultural considerations (Why shouldn ’ t a poor native of India profit from the carcass of a bird he would kill anyway to protect his crop? Why shouldn ’ t an overpopulated species be put to some use? Why can ’ t molted plumage be a profitable resource for native populations? What profit is there to England if a lucrative, tax-generating trade is abolished only to flourish elsewhere?).
Also, no anti-plumage society banned all plumage for millinery purposes. Domestic or ranched birds were acceptable. These included ostrich, eider, and all birds used as "articles of diet." Woolf herself states in her response to Massingham ’ s attack on "The Plumage Bill" that: "Cocks, hens, parrots, and ostriches are the only birds whose feathers I recognise or wear" ( Essays, 3:244, n.4). Legislative efforts varied from year to year as naturalists and conservationists researched and debated the status of specific species, the merits of specific species, and the methods of plumage gathering. The Plumage Bill of 1908 would have banned the importation and sale of exotic plumage. The successful Plumage Bill of 1921 banned the importation but not the sale of exotic plumage. It should also be mentioned that both the 1908 and 1921 bills exempted plumage worn by or carried with a traveler entering the country. In the United States, the 1914 Tariff Act banning exotic plumage made no such exemption. As a result, the public was outraged when women were detained at ports or followed by customs agents to their hotels in order to search for and/or confiscate banned plumage. An exemption for personal apparel was later added to the act (Doughty, 132).
6. In her response to Massingham ’ s attack on "The Plumage Bill," Woolf recalls that her vow was probably made at the age of ten "or thereabouts" (see note 3 above).
7. This is not to imply that feather fashions completely disappeared from the fashion vocabulary. The reemergence of sophisticated millinery in the 1930s through the 1950s ensured some use of feathers. Recently, the Princess of Wales revived the ostrich-plumed toque. The exotic, sensual, and sensuous appearance of feathers, lots of feathers, also ensured continued use of plumage in theatrical settings. Gaby Deslys (1881 – 1920), Mistinguett (1875 – 1956) and Josephine Baker (1906 – 1975) all used costumes made entirely of feathers. The originator of this "feathered theater" was Deslys, whom Sir Cecil Beaton (1904 – 1980) referred to as "a human aviary" (Gardiner, 40). The accomplishments and trademarks of these entertainers, feathers prominently included, are preserved in musical revues around the world. A contemporary feathered performer of note — courtesy of innumerable turkey feathers dyed a bright canary yellow — is Sesame Street ’ s Big Bird.
8. The Victorian world of the Stephen household — a world beautifully invoked by Quentin Bell in a passage on the family ’ s favorite "blood sport" of butterfly/moth hunting ( Virginia Woolf, 1:33) — was carried over into the world of Woolf ’ s maturity and to a Bloomsbury filled with real animals, animal sports, "animalized" humans, and animal products. All of Woolf ’ s brothers hunted birds — an activity enjoyed by young Jasper Ramsey in To the Lighthouse (1927) (26, 41, 123 – 24) — and/or foxes, or bird-watched ( Letters, 1:130, 170, 172). Virginia and Leonard Woolf nearly always maintained at least one dog in their household (Bell, Virginia Woolf, 2:175 – 76; see also Ritchie, xv – xvi). Leonard Woolf even owned a marmoset, which was said to resemble Josef Goebbels (Bell, Virginia Woolf, 2:189). Vanessa Stephen ’ s (1879 – 1961) marriage
to Clive Bell (1881 – 1962) in 1907 introduced Woolf to an unforgettable inkwell made of a hunter ’ s hoof, as well as to life on a country estate: "The place was populated by stuffed animals and to a large extent by living ones; animals dominated the conversation" (Bell, Virginia Woolf, 1:103).
As for "human" animals in Bloomsbury, Woolf was always "Goat" to her sister Vanessa. Vanessa was sometimes "Sheepdog." Woolf adopted the nickname "Sparroy" when writing to her dear friend Violet Dickinson (1865 – 1948). Woolf would become "Mandrill" (!) to Leonard Woolf ’ s "Mongoose." Vegetarianism appears to have been little known in early Bloomsbury. To Emma Vaughan (1874 – 1960; nicknamed "Toad"), Woolf wrote in August 1901 requesting a "long letter full of meat" ( Letters, 1:44). To Lady Robert Cecil, Woolf wrote (January 1907) a beautiful appreciative note for a birthday gift of pheasants and furs: "Now the pheasants are long since gone, and I think they were specially nice pheasants, and I gave my solitary wing some special attention — considering it as a piece of tender meat, critically. Why is there nothing written about food — only so much thought? . . . I am fitted with a marvellous simplicity of nature so that to buy a fur is impossible to me, but to accept a fur is quite easy and pleasant" ( Letters, 1:277 – 78). Clive Bell loved to criticize George Bernard Shaw (1856 – 1950), perhaps the most famous vegetarian of his time. Virginia quoted one Bellism on the subject in a letter to Lytton Strachey: " ‘ These vegetarians, my dear Virginia, always go at the top. [Shaw] needs Bullocks blood ’ " ( Letters, 2:508). One writer on vegetarianism in Woolf ’ s circle who certainly influenced Woolf ’ s feminism was the Greek scholar Jane Harrison (1850 – 1928; see Adams, 171).
Animals and Women Feminist The Page 37