Ancient and Modern Women in the Woman’s World

Under the editorship of Oscar Wilde, the Woman’s World combined fashion and fiction with more serious material on higher education. The popular dissemination of Hellenism through periodical culture is exemplified in articles on the poet Sappho and a review of Greek Plays at the universities. Topics such as marriage, politics and education are discussed in relation to the lives of women in the ancient world. The Woman’s World questions gender stereotypes by juxtaposing ancient and modern women, implicitly endorsing varied models of womanhood. The classical scholar Jane Ellen Harrison addresses herself to an audience of women readers, and discusses the similarities between modern collegiate life and the “woman’s world” which enabled Sappho to flourish in ancient Greece. The magazine offers an unfamiliar version of the reception of ancient Greece and Rome in late-Victorian aestheticism, accessible to a wide readership because it is often based on images rather than texts.