The Diary of Elizabeth Lee Growing up on Merseyside in the Late Nineteenth Century

by Pooley, Colin; Pooley, Siân; Lawton, Richard

• ISBN13: 9781846311413
• ISBN10: 1846311411
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2010-06-11
• Publisher: Liverpool University Press

Summary

Personal diaries provide rare glimpses into those aspects of the past that are usually hidden from view. Elizabeth Lee grew up on Merseyside in the late nineteenth century. She began her diary at the age of 16 in 1884 and it provides an unbroken record of her life up to the age of 25 in 1892.Elizabeth's father was a draper and outfitter with shops in Birkenhead, and throughout the period of the diary Elizabeth lived at home with her family in Prenton. However, she travelled widely on both sides of the Mersey and her diary provides an unusually revealing picture of middle-class life that begins to challenge conventional views of the position of young women in Victorian society.The book includes a detailed introduction to and analysis of the diary, together with a glossary relating to key people in the diary and maps of the localities in which Elizabeth lived her everyday life. There have been a number of diaries published relating to ‘ordinary' people, but most accounts were written retrospectively as life histories by people who eventually gained some degree of fame or prominence in society. This very rare first-hand account provides a unique insight into adolescent life in Victorian Britain.

Author Biography

Colin Pooley is professor of social and historical geography at Lancaster University. Siân Pooley is a research student at St. John’s College, Cambridge. Richard Lawton is professor emeritus of geography at the University of Liverpool.

Table of Contents

Preface	p. vii
Acknowledgements	p. ix
List of Figures and Tables	p. xi
List of Plates	p. xiii
The Diary of Elizabeth Lee: An Introductory Essay	p. 1
Origins of the diary	p. 1
Women in late-nineteenth-century England	p. 3
Merseyside in the late nineteenth century	p. 7
Diaries as sources for historical analysis	p. 11
Elizabeth Lee's diary: an assessment of the source	p. 13
The Lee family: an overview	p. 15
Aspects of Elizabeth Lee's life	p. 18
Conclusions	p. 54
Editorial Conventions Used in the Transcript of the Diary	p. 63
The Diary of Elizabeth Lee, 1884-1892	p. 65
Glossary of People Mentioned in the Diary	p. 461
Further Reading	p. 473
Index	p. 475
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