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| Although Mrs Beeton is known as a source of culinary inspiration, she meant much more than this to her contemporaries. She was the very embodiment of the Victorian ideology of a woman's place being in the home. |  |
One of the most famous books of the Victorian age is The Book of Household Management. With a History of the Origin, Properties, and Uses of all things connected with Home Life and Comfort by Isabella Mary Beeton (London, first edition 1861).
It's a useful source for social historians, because it's the best example of Victorian advice literature aimed at the new middle-class 'housewife' and her household staff. In the preface Isabella Beeton tells the reader what motivated her to write this book - her aim was to educate the housewife in order that she might achieve the perfect home.
'... there is no more fruitful source of family discontent than a housewife's badly cooked dinners and untidy ways.'
'What moved me, in the first instance, to attempt a work like this, was the discomfort and suffering which I had seen brought upon men and women by household mismanagement. I have always thought that there is no more fruitful source of family discontent than a housewife's badly cooked dinners and untidy ways. Men are now so well served out of doors - at their clubs, well-ordered taverns, and dining-houses - that, in order to compete with the attraction of these places, a mistress must be thoroughly acquainted with the theory and practice of cookery, as well as be perfectly conversant with all the other arts of making and keeping a comfortable home.'
In her introduction to the first edition of the book Isabella Beeton demonstrates her acceptance of the ideology of separate spheres - the woman at home, the man in public - and she states clearly that women are to blame if the home is not a welcoming place for the man to return to. The home and domestic management is women's responsibility. This book is designed to help women achieve one of their most important roles in life.
She has to be a multi-skilled manager, capable of dealing competently with husband, children and servants. The passages below emphasise the importance not only of her organisational skills, but of her temper or character,and contrasts the ideal housewife with other types of women, who are not so committed to domesticity.
'Gentleness, not partial and temporary, but universal and regular, should pervade her conduct ...'
'As with the commander of an army, or the leader of an enterprise, so is it with the mistress of a house. Her spirit will be seen through the whole establishment; and just in proportion as she performs her duties intelligently and thoroughly, so will her domestics follow in her path. Of all those acquirements which more particularly belong to the female character there are none which take a higher rank, in our estimation, than such as enter into a knowledge of household duties; for on these are perpetually dependent the happiness, comfort and well-being of a family.
'In this opinion we are borne out by the author of The Vicar of Wakefield who says: "The modest virgin, the prudent wife, and the careful matron, are much more serviceable in life than petticoated philosophers, blustering heroines, or virago queans [sic]. She who makes her husband and her children happy, who reclaims the one from vice and trains up the other to virtue, is a much greater character than ladies described in romances, whose whole occupation is to murder mankind with shafts from their quiver, or their eyes...".
'Good Temper should be cultivated by every mistress, as upon it the welfare of the household maybe said to turn; indeed its influence can hardly be over-estimated, as it has the effect of moulding the characters of those around her, and of acting most beneficially on the happiness of the domestic circle.
'Every head of a household should strive to be cheerful, and should never fail to show a deep interest in all that appertains to the well-being of those who claim the protection of her roof. Gentleness, not partial and temporary, but universal and regular, should pervade her conduct; for where such a spirit is habitually manifested, it not only delights her children, but makes her domestics attentive and respectful; her visitors are pleased by it, and their happiness is increased.'
Isabella Beeton's description of the character and responsibilities of the ideal mistress of the house compares her to an army commander. The mistress has the power to influence the atmosphere of the entire household - therefore it is incumbent upon her not only to radiate good temper but also to be disciplined and organised.
Thus the mistress is at the core of the household - everything revolves around her, but at the same time, if anything goes wrong, then she is to blame. In this way Mrs Beeton places a great deal of responsibility on a woman's shoulders. In short, the mistress is to be selfless.
The good housewife was she who sacrificed her own needs to the comfort and happiness of her family and household. Hence Beeton's dismissal of learned or feisty, independent women ('petticoated philosophers' and 'blustering heroines'), who put their own ambition above the needs of others.
'Visiting the houses of the poor is the only practical way really to understand the actual state of each family ...'
'Charity and Benevolence are duties which a mistress owes to herself as well as to her fellow creatures; and there is scarcely any income so small but something may be spared from it, even if it be but "the widow's mite". It is always to be remembered, however, that it is the spirit of charity which imparts to the gift a value beyond its actual amount, and is by far its better part...
'Visiting the houses of the poor is the only practical way really to understand the actual state of each family ... Great advantages may result from visits paid to the poor; for there being, unfortunately, much ignorance, generally amongst them with respect to all household knowledge, there will be opportunity for advising and instructing them, in a pleasant and unobtrusive manner, in cleanliness, industry, cookery and good management.'
For the indomitable Beeton, it was insufficient for the mistress of a household to fulfil her duties to her own family. She was also to think of the greater social good, and the passages above show how strongly Beeton urges the housewife to place herself in the service of others through charitable giving and visiting.
This passage also alerts us to the writer's attitude to relations between the social classes. She regarded the poor as ignorant in household matters, people who could only benefit from any advice given by their social betters. This betrays a misunderstanding of the conditions in which many working-class women lived, and which were hardly likely to be improved by advice from middle-class ladies.
This source provides a wonderful insight into how the the ideal bourgeois household in the Victorian era was viewed at the time, but we should take care not to assume that advice books such as this one were followed word-for-word by housewives and their servants.
This was a work of reference, to be dipped into when there was a problem with staff, or when a new recipe or lavish party was called for. It is unlikely that many would have treated this highly prescriptive book as a bible. In the context of the time, Mrs Beeton's standard of household management was an ideal to aspire to, but we can be sure that most households could not, and did not, reach the level of perfection described.
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