Despite the gains made by women during the last half of the nineteenth century in the U.S., at the turn of the century (1900) women were still viewed and treated by society primarily as second-class citizens. While the Suffragettes, aided by working women and some political support, did experience some gains for women during this era, women enjoyed relatively few rights and had no political rights in 1900. Gender roles were rigidly defined in this era in American history. Women got married, had children and stayed at home taking care of them and their husbands. Those women who worked found labor in service occupations such as maid or waitress. Women were considered the “delicate” sex and as such they were relegated to an inferior role to men in all aspects of society. In fact, Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s short story The Yellow Wallpaper mocks the infamous “rest cure” prescribed to women in this era. Women were considered “nervous” if they did not subscribe to gender roles. The rest cure was a ridiculous plan to confine women to bed rest for weeks on end: “Three weeks at the least are required for the process. During this time the patient should remain in bed except an hour or two a day, when she can sit in an easy chair at the window and read something light....Tea, coffees and wines are forbidden” (Esposito 2). We can see this “cure” was for women only. We also see how men viewed women as being unable to handle anything more than “light” reading from an intellectual point-of-view.
Sexuality was taboo as an act and a topic of discussion for “ladies” in this era. In 1909 when Olga Nethersole produced Sapho, featuring an unmarried sexual woman, she was put on trial for “violating public decency” (Wright 2). Despite the constraints on women’s roles and behavior during the turn of the century in the U.S., many women challenged such constraints. For exampl
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