Bibliograph

Scotch Verdict, The Real-Life Story That Inspired "The Children's Hour", Lillian Faderman

Type

Label

Scotch Verdict, The Real-Life Story That Inspired "The Children's Hour", Lillian Faderman

Language

eng

Index

no index present

Literary Form

non fiction

Main title

Scotch Verdict

Nature of contents

dictionaries

Responsibility statement

Lillian Faderman

Sub title

The Real-Life Story That Inspired "The Children's Hour"

Summary

In 1810, a Scottish student named Jane Cumming accused her school mistresses, Jane Pirie and Marianne Woods, of having an affair in the presence of their students. Dame Cumming Gordon, the wealthy and powerful grandmother of the accusing student, advises her friends to remove their daughters from the Drumsheugh boarding school. Within days, the institution is deserted and two women are deprived of their livelihoods. Award-winning author Lillian Faderman recreates the events surrounding this notorious case, which became the basis for Lillian Hellman's famous play, The Children's Hour. Reconstructing the libel suit filed by Pirie and Woods, which resulted in a scotch verdict, or a verdict of inconclusive/not proven, Faderman builds a compelling narrative from court transcripts, judge's notes, witnesses' contradictory testimony, and the prejudices of the men presiding over the case. Her fascinating portrait documents the social, economic, and sexual pressures that shaped the lives of nineteenth-century women and the issues of class and gender that contributed to their marginalization

Target audience

adult

Classification