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Can Any Mother Help Me?
In 1935, a young woman wrote a letter to the women's magazine Nursery World:
'Can any mother help me? I live a very lonely life as I have no near neighbours. I cannot afford to buy a wireless. I adore reading, but with no library am very limited with books ... I know it is bad to brood and breed hard thoughts. Can any reader suggest an occupation that will intrigue me and exclude 'thinking' and cost nothing!'
Women from all over the country wrote back expressing similar frustrations. They were full of ideas and opinions but had nowhere to express them. So they decided to start a private magazine.
The Cooperative Correspondence Club - or CCC as it quickly became known - was a place for these women to describe the subjects close to their heart: the pain and elation of childbirth, difficulties during wartime, or the struggles and comedies of daily life. None of the women anticipated the way that the magazine would come to play such an important part in their lives.
In Can Any Mother Help Me? Jenna Bailey presents the extraordinary group of wives and mothers whose lives connected through a magazine. Her book is an intimate and moving collection of personal stories and, above all, a portrait of inseparable friendships.
'Can any mother help me? I live a very lonely life as I have no near neighbours. I cannot afford to buy a wireless. I adore reading, but with no library am very limited with books ... I know it is bad to brood and breed hard thoughts. Can any reader suggest an occupation that will intrigue me and exclude 'thinking' and cost nothing!'
Women from all over the country wrote back expressing similar frustrations. They were full of ideas and opinions but had nowhere to express them. So they decided to start a private magazine.
The Cooperative Correspondence Club - or CCC as it quickly became known - was a place for these women to describe the subjects close to their heart: the pain and elation of childbirth, difficulties during wartime, or the struggles and comedies of daily life. None of the women anticipated the way that the magazine would come to play such an important part in their lives.
In Can Any Mother Help Me? Jenna Bailey presents the extraordinary group of wives and mothers whose lives connected through a magazine. Her book is an intimate and moving collection of personal stories and, above all, a portrait of inseparable friendships.
343 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2007
17 people are currently reading
420 people want to read
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January 31, 2025
Don't be put off by the title!
This is riveting, poignant, uplifting, occasionally shocking, but never sentimental. It's real life correspondence, spanning decades.
Not my usual sort of book, or one that fits the chick-lit cover and cheesy title, but it is a quirky, charming, moving, unsentimental, and revealing peek into women's lives over half a century. It's very easy to dip in and out of and is likely to make most modern readers very grateful for what they have, without ever being misery lit, or anything of that ilk.
It is a compilation of articles (personal letters, really) written for a small fortnightly private magazine, shared between ~20 women, starting just before WW2, and continuing till death did them part.
Who it's By and About
The women were all young mothers, mostly well-educated, and frustrated with the confines of domesticity; children and parenting were explicitly not the focus of the magazine, though they certainly cropped up often. In other respects they were remarkably diverse in geography, political and religious views, employment, relationships, and financial status. Several were notably unconventional in their day, including a conscientious objector, a self-sufficient eco couple, and a vegetarian - alongside a minor aristocrat. Perhaps the most startling thing is how large their families were: one had seven children and most had at least four.
Image: Stage production (which I didn't see), but I like the staging (Source)
The introduction explains the context and how the CCC (Co-operative Correspondence Club) started. Thereafter, excerpts are broadly chronological and grouped thematically. Early chapters focus on small children and the war, while the closing ones discuss the difficulties of ageing and the pain of loss. In addition, there are brief biographies of each woman and a smattering of photos.
Parallels with Online Groups and Social Media
CCC provided a support network for these women (though there were fallings out as well) through war, illness, abandonment, relocation, and other upheavals. The initial anonymity enabled them to discuss issues that might otherwise have been taboo ("what was written in the magazine stayed in the magazine"), but most of them did get to know each other in real life, and an annual lunch happened for more than 40 years. As the single copy of each issue circulated, comments on the articles extended the conversation; often these were supportive, but sometimes combative.
There are close parallels with some online groups today. If that sounds a bit of a stretch, it is only because you have not encountered such groups; I can assure you they exist. Not the huge, and sometimes combative, sites like Mumsnet. I was involved in a grammar group (on Facebook), and then another, and then another. They seemed to have a natural lifespan, after which things would descend into acrimony, so the less argumentative people would start a new group. After about the sixth incarnation in several years, during which the core had shrunk to about 70 people (men and women) and some had linked up directly, we realised we were talking about far more than language. So we started yet another group. It's by far the longest-lasting, still happily ticking over a decade later. It has no theme; it's just a meeting place and talking shop for friends. It's a secret group, so conversations are private (except to the eyes of spies!) and we have supported each other through joys, tragedies, and dramas of many kinds. We also have a lot of fun (and discuss grammar very rarely). Most of us have met several other members more than once. A few have even flown to other continents to meet. It sounds a little strange, but even those I have yet to meet in person are very real friends.
Other Ways of Living
For its members, CCC was also an opportunity to see how other women lived and coped. Most were born Edwardians and lived through two world wars, into the swinging 60s, so they experienced huge change during their lives. In their youth, the marriage bar was far more rigid than I'd realised: one woman loved her job so much, she delayed marriage for three years because once married, she'd be forced to give it up. For modern readers, these contrasts are even greater.
Image: "Why, I'd be delighted to put my needs last again" by Annie Taintor (Source)
For readers today, it is fascinating glimpse not just into the past, but into a variety of pasts that are, in some ways, very different from now, but are still within living memory.
Noteworthy Incidents
Some of the articles that stood out for me, whether for power or sheer curiosity:
* Finding a crashed German bomber and the pilot's bloody body, and trying to resolve the contradictions: "a man, who this morning had his breakfast...He was someone's child, someone's brother perhaps... This is war, I said... No, God, no, I screamed inside myself. This is wrong, wrong."
* POWs not only missed out on promotion, but had their pay cut. One woman's husband was imprisoned for most of the war and when he finally returned, he was confined to low ranking admin jobs, which were unsatisfying at a personal and financial level.
* The strange beauty of the infamous London fog of 1952: "I felt as if I was inside a pearl...it did give me a strange feeling to be so enclosed by white vaporous walls, in such a silent little world, a world in which all colours were muted to dim greys except for the white frosted edges of leaves and branches."
* An eye-witness account of braving awful weather to be in the crowd at the coronation is beautifully written, and is interesting because it's not set at the best viewing point or written by an ardent royalist who'd planned the trip for months.
* Despite tacit agreement not to say much about husbands or marriage, one woman asked another whether her anti-contraception belief that sex must include the possibility of conception meant she was or would be chaste post-menopause! Sadly, it doesn't give the answer.
* A doctor suspected a baby had Down's Syndrome but didn't even hint at the possibility to the parents for over a year, and even then, it was only the father he told!
* One child was sent to boarding school (albeit weekdays only) shortly before his third birthday!
* There is an amusingly euphemistic description of the failings of the rhythm method and other amateur contraception by a woman who had turned out to be "recklessly philo-progenitive and quite capable of filling his (sic) house with noisy pledges of my affection while blandly protesting every time that I didn't know the gun was loaded."
* When real tragedies arise, there are no euphemisms, just raw and honest pain, told in an unsentimental way to friends. There was one particular section relating to a disabled grandchild that really chocked me up. Such powerful writing.
Editing Issues
This ought to be a 5* book, and the articles are indeed wonderful; the weakness is in the way the book has been compiled, hence only 4*. In particular:
* There is no index (unforgivable in most non-fiction, especially something like this, and relatively easy to create with modern technology).
* There are footnotes in the back which are mostly patronising (e.g. that Huw is the Welsh version of Hugh!), banal or dull, but which are not referenced in the text, so you have to keep flicking to and fro to see if there are any notes relating to what you're reading.
* The bios are in two places, but not exactly duplicated, which means there is pointless repetition and more cause for to-ing and fro-ing (and if you read the ones at the back too early on, some contain spoilers). There are even inconsistencies between them, such as one woman's children being born in 1930, '33 and '34, but in '58 they were apparently aged 28, 26 and 23.
* There are some asides by the compiler that she does not back up, so it's hard to know whether they are based on articles that are not included, or her leaping to conclusions based on her own ideas and prejudices.
Even so, the actual content makes it worth the irritations caused by a poor compiler. A fascinating book.
This is riveting, poignant, uplifting, occasionally shocking, but never sentimental. It's real life correspondence, spanning decades.
Not my usual sort of book, or one that fits the chick-lit cover and cheesy title, but it is a quirky, charming, moving, unsentimental, and revealing peek into women's lives over half a century. It's very easy to dip in and out of and is likely to make most modern readers very grateful for what they have, without ever being misery lit, or anything of that ilk.
It is a compilation of articles (personal letters, really) written for a small fortnightly private magazine, shared between ~20 women, starting just before WW2, and continuing till death did them part.
Who it's By and About
The women were all young mothers, mostly well-educated, and frustrated with the confines of domesticity; children and parenting were explicitly not the focus of the magazine, though they certainly cropped up often. In other respects they were remarkably diverse in geography, political and religious views, employment, relationships, and financial status. Several were notably unconventional in their day, including a conscientious objector, a self-sufficient eco couple, and a vegetarian - alongside a minor aristocrat. Perhaps the most startling thing is how large their families were: one had seven children and most had at least four.
Image: Stage production (which I didn't see), but I like the staging (Source)
The introduction explains the context and how the CCC (Co-operative Correspondence Club) started. Thereafter, excerpts are broadly chronological and grouped thematically. Early chapters focus on small children and the war, while the closing ones discuss the difficulties of ageing and the pain of loss. In addition, there are brief biographies of each woman and a smattering of photos.
Parallels with Online Groups and Social Media
CCC provided a support network for these women (though there were fallings out as well) through war, illness, abandonment, relocation, and other upheavals. The initial anonymity enabled them to discuss issues that might otherwise have been taboo ("what was written in the magazine stayed in the magazine"), but most of them did get to know each other in real life, and an annual lunch happened for more than 40 years. As the single copy of each issue circulated, comments on the articles extended the conversation; often these were supportive, but sometimes combative.
There are close parallels with some online groups today. If that sounds a bit of a stretch, it is only because you have not encountered such groups; I can assure you they exist. Not the huge, and sometimes combative, sites like Mumsnet. I was involved in a grammar group (on Facebook), and then another, and then another. They seemed to have a natural lifespan, after which things would descend into acrimony, so the less argumentative people would start a new group. After about the sixth incarnation in several years, during which the core had shrunk to about 70 people (men and women) and some had linked up directly, we realised we were talking about far more than language. So we started yet another group. It's by far the longest-lasting, still happily ticking over a decade later. It has no theme; it's just a meeting place and talking shop for friends. It's a secret group, so conversations are private (except to the eyes of spies!) and we have supported each other through joys, tragedies, and dramas of many kinds. We also have a lot of fun (and discuss grammar very rarely). Most of us have met several other members more than once. A few have even flown to other continents to meet. It sounds a little strange, but even those I have yet to meet in person are very real friends.
Other Ways of Living
For its members, CCC was also an opportunity to see how other women lived and coped. Most were born Edwardians and lived through two world wars, into the swinging 60s, so they experienced huge change during their lives. In their youth, the marriage bar was far more rigid than I'd realised: one woman loved her job so much, she delayed marriage for three years because once married, she'd be forced to give it up. For modern readers, these contrasts are even greater.
Image: "Why, I'd be delighted to put my needs last again" by Annie Taintor (Source)
For readers today, it is fascinating glimpse not just into the past, but into a variety of pasts that are, in some ways, very different from now, but are still within living memory.
Noteworthy Incidents
Some of the articles that stood out for me, whether for power or sheer curiosity:
* Finding a crashed German bomber and the pilot's bloody body, and trying to resolve the contradictions: "a man, who this morning had his breakfast...He was someone's child, someone's brother perhaps... This is war, I said... No, God, no, I screamed inside myself. This is wrong, wrong."
* POWs not only missed out on promotion, but had their pay cut. One woman's husband was imprisoned for most of the war and when he finally returned, he was confined to low ranking admin jobs, which were unsatisfying at a personal and financial level.
* The strange beauty of the infamous London fog of 1952: "I felt as if I was inside a pearl...it did give me a strange feeling to be so enclosed by white vaporous walls, in such a silent little world, a world in which all colours were muted to dim greys except for the white frosted edges of leaves and branches."
* An eye-witness account of braving awful weather to be in the crowd at the coronation is beautifully written, and is interesting because it's not set at the best viewing point or written by an ardent royalist who'd planned the trip for months.
* Despite tacit agreement not to say much about husbands or marriage, one woman asked another whether her anti-contraception belief that sex must include the possibility of conception meant she was or would be chaste post-menopause! Sadly, it doesn't give the answer.
* A doctor suspected a baby had Down's Syndrome but didn't even hint at the possibility to the parents for over a year, and even then, it was only the father he told!
* One child was sent to boarding school (albeit weekdays only) shortly before his third birthday!
* There is an amusingly euphemistic description of the failings of the rhythm method and other amateur contraception by a woman who had turned out to be "recklessly philo-progenitive and quite capable of filling his (sic) house with noisy pledges of my affection while blandly protesting every time that I didn't know the gun was loaded."
* When real tragedies arise, there are no euphemisms, just raw and honest pain, told in an unsentimental way to friends. There was one particular section relating to a disabled grandchild that really chocked me up. Such powerful writing.
Editing Issues
This ought to be a 5* book, and the articles are indeed wonderful; the weakness is in the way the book has been compiled, hence only 4*. In particular:
* There is no index (unforgivable in most non-fiction, especially something like this, and relatively easy to create with modern technology).
* There are footnotes in the back which are mostly patronising (e.g. that Huw is the Welsh version of Hugh!), banal or dull, but which are not referenced in the text, so you have to keep flicking to and fro to see if there are any notes relating to what you're reading.
* The bios are in two places, but not exactly duplicated, which means there is pointless repetition and more cause for to-ing and fro-ing (and if you read the ones at the back too early on, some contain spoilers). There are even inconsistencies between them, such as one woman's children being born in 1930, '33 and '34, but in '58 they were apparently aged 28, 26 and 23.
* There are some asides by the compiler that she does not back up, so it's hard to know whether they are based on articles that are not included, or her leaping to conclusions based on her own ideas and prejudices.
Even so, the actual content makes it worth the irritations caused by a poor compiler. A fascinating book.
May 20, 2015
This was an unusual and excellent book about the lives of some interesting women. Not famous women, but women with a story. Cecily has reviewed it superbly well, and I have nothing to add to her insights. Her review is here...
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
April 2, 2020
Notwithstanding the slightly drippy title and cover, this was a fascinating read. While researching for her Master's degree, the author came across a treasure trove: a private magazine called the Cooperative Correspondence Club, or C.C.C., written and circulated by a group of women, primarily living in England, between the 1930s and the 1970s. It began when one of them wrote a letter to a 'public' mothers' magazine, lamenting her rural loneliness, lack of access to libraries, and so on. Other women wrote to her in support, but rather than incur the cost of writing back separate letters to each, she suggested she compile them and they circulate the collection amongst themselves. This turned into a twice-a-month compilation that extended for 40+ years, with the women writing about their lives, exchanging thoughts, and commenting on each others' articles. While there were some changes in membership over the years, they formed a remarkably stable group of women from a variety of backgrounds who supported each other through life events and struggles (war, loneliness, mental and physical illness, divorce, widowhood, child-rearing, etc.).
A few of the many things that particularly struck me:
- more than one woman mentions a childbirth expert of the day, of whom I hadn't heard, Grantly Dick-Read. There was a big gap between his expert advice and their experience. It seems his brilliant advice was that pain in childbirth is all down to the woman being afraid of her natural womanly role. Ugh! What a jerk!
- how important the club was as a way out of loneliness, and to share life's challenges. A bit like some social media now, but with so much patience and craft.
- the effect of the 'marriage bar,' often preventing married women from carrying on in their occupations. All of these smart women pushed out and seeking an outlet. One woman had to quit her job because the bank her husband worked for wouldn't let employees' wives work! Even though she earned more. She had worked for a cocoa importer, and as part of her leaving package she was given a big slab of Terry's Bitter Chocolate, which she would pack in her husband's lunch. Bitter chocolate indeed...
- the final section on aging was quite sad. Some of the women wrote eloquently about the indignities of age. It makes me want to hide under the duvet and slather myself with moisturizer while guzzling vitamins as I stare into the void.
I thought the volume itself might have been put together a bit better, but found it all very interesting.
A few of the many things that particularly struck me:
- more than one woman mentions a childbirth expert of the day, of whom I hadn't heard, Grantly Dick-Read. There was a big gap between his expert advice and their experience. It seems his brilliant advice was that pain in childbirth is all down to the woman being afraid of her natural womanly role. Ugh! What a jerk!
- how important the club was as a way out of loneliness, and to share life's challenges. A bit like some social media now, but with so much patience and craft.
- the effect of the 'marriage bar,' often preventing married women from carrying on in their occupations. All of these smart women pushed out and seeking an outlet. One woman had to quit her job because the bank her husband worked for wouldn't let employees' wives work! Even though she earned more. She had worked for a cocoa importer, and as part of her leaving package she was given a big slab of Terry's Bitter Chocolate, which she would pack in her husband's lunch. Bitter chocolate indeed...
- the final section on aging was quite sad. Some of the women wrote eloquently about the indignities of age. It makes me want to hide under the duvet and slather myself with moisturizer while guzzling vitamins as I stare into the void.
I thought the volume itself might have been put together a bit better, but found it all very interesting.
April 17, 2008
This is a fascinating, moving book about a group of mothers who set up a correspondence club in the 1930s, writing a private magazine each month, circulated among members, about every aspect of their lives. Amazingly, the group carried on until 1990. A lot of the original articles are included and are wonderful. I couldn't put it down! This strikes me as in many ways showing the way forward to the groups which have grown up in recent years thanks to the internet.
I should say that the pink cover and the book's title are very misleading - this is no sugary confection, but a book covering everything from detailed accounts of labour to nervous breakdowns, bereavements, divorce, caring for disabled children and a wife's unrequited love for another man. Although the author says she wanted to look at the lives of ordinary people, these highly-educated women, all with powerful individual voices, seem anything but ordinary. But then, whose life really is ordinary when you look at it in detail?
I should say that the pink cover and the book's title are very misleading - this is no sugary confection, but a book covering everything from detailed accounts of labour to nervous breakdowns, bereavements, divorce, caring for disabled children and a wife's unrequited love for another man. Although the author says she wanted to look at the lives of ordinary people, these highly-educated women, all with powerful individual voices, seem anything but ordinary. But then, whose life really is ordinary when you look at it in detail?
June 25, 2020
While the story behind this book is fascinating, and it's wonderful that such a good part of the archive of articles survives, I didn't find the reading of Jenna Bailey's curated sampling of them to be a particularly engaging experience. I had trouble distinguishing most of the women from each other (so many seemed to have four sons!), which made it hard to care very deeply about their personal concerns.
April 6, 2024
An unusual and revealing perspective on the lives of a group of women through a recent period of history, when their lives and social expectations were still in so many ways very different from ours. Lots to reflect on - including how our own views and attitudes may seem to women in future generations. Really glad to have read this, though initially it took me a bit of getting started!
April 13, 2016
This is a window into women's lives in the U.K. in the 1930s and 40s. There is a lot about children, relationships and household chores interspersed with other important areas of their lives and the world around them.
March 31, 2012
You know a book has really touched you when you start telling people you have only just met about it. I found myself doing just this with Can Any Mother Help Me?
It is a fascinating collection of articles pulled together expertly by Jenna Bailey. In the 1930's a struggling Mum wrote to Nursery World Magazine to ask for help to alleviate her worries and boredom with being a stay at home mother, who couldn't afford a wireless and had no library near by. What evolved from this letter was the birth of a postal co-operative correspondence club. The members would pen various articles on subjects as diverse as childbirth, job satisfaction, illness, affairs and one event that took place in a church, involved an unwanted advance and resulted in said assailant lying in a pool of blood after being hit repeatedly with a stiletto! The articles were sent to the editor who lovingly combined them all into a hand stitched linen cover and the magazine was sent off to the first recipient on the mailing list. They would read, make comment and post to the next person.
What made it all the more intriguing was that all the ladies had pseudonyms to preserve their identities. They did all become lifelong friends and through the second world war many sent their children to live with CCC friends in the country. They met up annually and were a real lifeline for each other at times.
The CCC spanned some 55 years, from it's inception in 1935 to 1990, when many of the original members had died. One of the founder members Elektra lived to be over 100 and met with the author to fill in the gaps to the articles and identities of the contributors. You'll feel that you know these ladies by the end of the book and wish you could have met them.
The book made me think about our modern day equivalent of blogging. Sharing our lives with others and taking comfort in similar experiences and support of like minded peers. I wonder if we'll still be in contact with some of our peers for the next 50 years, or what future medium we'll be using in the future.
I really recommend this book, it was my first book I read on the Kindle, yet another modern day innovation that keeps us reading and accessing information in new ways - a far stretch away from handwritten letters bound in linen covers.
It is a fascinating collection of articles pulled together expertly by Jenna Bailey. In the 1930's a struggling Mum wrote to Nursery World Magazine to ask for help to alleviate her worries and boredom with being a stay at home mother, who couldn't afford a wireless and had no library near by. What evolved from this letter was the birth of a postal co-operative correspondence club. The members would pen various articles on subjects as diverse as childbirth, job satisfaction, illness, affairs and one event that took place in a church, involved an unwanted advance and resulted in said assailant lying in a pool of blood after being hit repeatedly with a stiletto! The articles were sent to the editor who lovingly combined them all into a hand stitched linen cover and the magazine was sent off to the first recipient on the mailing list. They would read, make comment and post to the next person.
What made it all the more intriguing was that all the ladies had pseudonyms to preserve their identities. They did all become lifelong friends and through the second world war many sent their children to live with CCC friends in the country. They met up annually and were a real lifeline for each other at times.
The CCC spanned some 55 years, from it's inception in 1935 to 1990, when many of the original members had died. One of the founder members Elektra lived to be over 100 and met with the author to fill in the gaps to the articles and identities of the contributors. You'll feel that you know these ladies by the end of the book and wish you could have met them.
The book made me think about our modern day equivalent of blogging. Sharing our lives with others and taking comfort in similar experiences and support of like minded peers. I wonder if we'll still be in contact with some of our peers for the next 50 years, or what future medium we'll be using in the future.
I really recommend this book, it was my first book I read on the Kindle, yet another modern day innovation that keeps us reading and accessing information in new ways - a far stretch away from handwritten letters bound in linen covers.
May 16, 2019
This is not a parenting manual, which you might think from the title. This is not chick lit, which you might think from the pretty cover. In some ways I think this would be an absolute gold mine for a social historian looking at women's lives in the 1900s. It's a gorgeous book, wonderful read, but so sad towards the end, as life is.
It's about a private correspondance magazine - apparently there were a lot of them- that started in the 1930s and ended about 1990. That is an impressive run. It started off with a personal ad/agony letter in a "Nursery World" magazine by a woman living in Ireland (I think) who was living a bit remote with her little children, running the house etc, but she felt isolated, starved of other things to think about and people to talk to and it was getting her down. This was back in the 30's when the woman's place was most definately in the home, they weren't allowed to continue working when they got married, and raising children was supposed to be all they needed to fulfill them. So, a number of women responded to her, and they decided to set up a private magazine. They'd all write articles on what was going on in their life with the family, current events they'd seen, politics, whatever they wanted; send them in to the "editor", who would compile them twice a month, put them in an embroidered cover and the magazine would get posted woman to woman, who could write her thoughts and comments on the articles as the magazine went round. This became a lifeline for the women, they made great friends, visited each other, some even took in other's kids during the second world war. They came from all parts of the UK, rural and urban, mostly a better off class (many had nannies, cleaning help in the home etc etc) although they did number a working class mum (Cotton Goods) amoung them.
As this was going for decades, the hoard of articles will be immense, so Bailey focuses on a number of the women (who they, or their families - many were deceased when she came to this magazine stored in library archives - gave consent) and has selected articles on various aspects of life. Yes, there are some about childbirth and rearing, families growing up, also the frustrations of being home alone, then current events they experienced - for example read about the London fog, or the coronation of the Queen - and then later on with grandchildren, and the sad realities of life... some women outliving some of their children (or grandchildren - there's a really sad account in here, be warned), and then death of partners and illness and coming mortality for themselves.
It's such a wonderful idea though, this magazine of friends and how long it lasted. I wish people did more things like this now. I realise email, facebook etc has taken over in some ways, and there are similar online communities. Whether they survive as long remains to be seen. But the digital is so impersonal compared to having a physical magazine or letter in your hands, to see someone's handwriting... And as certain aspects of life we've all got to go through, I found some sections of this supportive and as solace reading right now. The decades don't change some life experiences at all.
It's about a private correspondance magazine - apparently there were a lot of them- that started in the 1930s and ended about 1990. That is an impressive run. It started off with a personal ad/agony letter in a "Nursery World" magazine by a woman living in Ireland (I think) who was living a bit remote with her little children, running the house etc, but she felt isolated, starved of other things to think about and people to talk to and it was getting her down. This was back in the 30's when the woman's place was most definately in the home, they weren't allowed to continue working when they got married, and raising children was supposed to be all they needed to fulfill them. So, a number of women responded to her, and they decided to set up a private magazine. They'd all write articles on what was going on in their life with the family, current events they'd seen, politics, whatever they wanted; send them in to the "editor", who would compile them twice a month, put them in an embroidered cover and the magazine would get posted woman to woman, who could write her thoughts and comments on the articles as the magazine went round. This became a lifeline for the women, they made great friends, visited each other, some even took in other's kids during the second world war. They came from all parts of the UK, rural and urban, mostly a better off class (many had nannies, cleaning help in the home etc etc) although they did number a working class mum (Cotton Goods) amoung them.
As this was going for decades, the hoard of articles will be immense, so Bailey focuses on a number of the women (who they, or their families - many were deceased when she came to this magazine stored in library archives - gave consent) and has selected articles on various aspects of life. Yes, there are some about childbirth and rearing, families growing up, also the frustrations of being home alone, then current events they experienced - for example read about the London fog, or the coronation of the Queen - and then later on with grandchildren, and the sad realities of life... some women outliving some of their children (or grandchildren - there's a really sad account in here, be warned), and then death of partners and illness and coming mortality for themselves.
It's such a wonderful idea though, this magazine of friends and how long it lasted. I wish people did more things like this now. I realise email, facebook etc has taken over in some ways, and there are similar online communities. Whether they survive as long remains to be seen. But the digital is so impersonal compared to having a physical magazine or letter in your hands, to see someone's handwriting... And as certain aspects of life we've all got to go through, I found some sections of this supportive and as solace reading right now. The decades don't change some life experiences at all.
July 1, 2022
In 1935 an isolated young mother wrote a letter to a magazine which resulted in a group of English, Scottish and Welsh women beginning their own newsletter by correspondence. They continued - those who survived - until 1990, writing regular articles about the joys and tragedies of their lives. Some of the articles were eventually donated to the Mass Observation social history project, where Jenna Bailey found them and sought permission from the women's families to publish a selection, first for a thesis, then as this book.
Highly recommended for anyone who enjoys social history or the type of books that Persephone Books publish. But be warned that towards the end there are some harrowing descriptions of illness, particularly cancer treatments of the time, and bereavement.
Highly recommended for anyone who enjoys social history or the type of books that Persephone Books publish. But be warned that towards the end there are some harrowing descriptions of illness, particularly cancer treatments of the time, and bereavement.
February 27, 2009
I have a feeling you would like this book, Gina.
We read it as part of my book reading group. It's a really interesting piece of social history. It's about a group of women who formed a secret correspondence club in the 1930s, and continued it throughout most of the twentieth century. The letters and documents from the correspondence club are housed at Sussex University. Jenna Bailey (as part of her academic research - can't remember if it was for a Master's or a PhD) studied the letters and put some of the most interesting ones together to form this book.
Some of the women are still alive - one was 102 when the book was published two years ago.
They are a fascinating group of people, who all had amazing achievements despite expectations that they should be stay-at-home mothers. One was a scriptwriter for Dr Finlay's Casebook; one was a trainer for Marriage Guidance Council counsellors; several founded and ran charities of various descriptions; one bought, managed and ran a farm, more or less single-handedly.
It all makes me feel quite ashamed that I achieve so little!
We have some good books coming up for the book group over the next few months, including Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke, and A Girl's Guide to Philosophy by Charlotte Greig (I think, Emma, that the latter is similar to Sophie's World).
We read it as part of my book reading group. It's a really interesting piece of social history. It's about a group of women who formed a secret correspondence club in the 1930s, and continued it throughout most of the twentieth century. The letters and documents from the correspondence club are housed at Sussex University. Jenna Bailey (as part of her academic research - can't remember if it was for a Master's or a PhD) studied the letters and put some of the most interesting ones together to form this book.
Some of the women are still alive - one was 102 when the book was published two years ago.
They are a fascinating group of people, who all had amazing achievements despite expectations that they should be stay-at-home mothers. One was a scriptwriter for Dr Finlay's Casebook; one was a trainer for Marriage Guidance Council counsellors; several founded and ran charities of various descriptions; one bought, managed and ran a farm, more or less single-handedly.
It all makes me feel quite ashamed that I achieve so little!
We have some good books coming up for the book group over the next few months, including Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke, and A Girl's Guide to Philosophy by Charlotte Greig (I think, Emma, that the latter is similar to Sophie's World).
July 12, 2011
I found this book quite by accident, while browsing the amazon links from Nella Last's War, and I'm so glad I did. I loved it. (Although I'm inclined to wonder whether there were lots more mundane articles in the magazine that didn't make the cut of the book, since surely if they were written by ordinary people, a lot of the time their lives must have been as boring as my own.)
The women in the book were fascinating, and the articles they wrote were very revealing about everyday life. They didn't seem to fit the stereotypical norm of women in mid-twentieth century England, but I like them none the less for that.
It's a completely different sort of Mass Observation book than Nella Last, as it doesn't paint a chronological history of anything, and is instead organised by topic. I think my favorite section was the story one of the women told about her grandson who suffered from Tuberous Sclerosis and seizures, and how that affected him and his family - a really revealing portrait of the family under pressure.
Well worth reading.
The women in the book were fascinating, and the articles they wrote were very revealing about everyday life. They didn't seem to fit the stereotypical norm of women in mid-twentieth century England, but I like them none the less for that.
It's a completely different sort of Mass Observation book than Nella Last, as it doesn't paint a chronological history of anything, and is instead organised by topic. I think my favorite section was the story one of the women told about her grandson who suffered from Tuberous Sclerosis and seizures, and how that affected him and his family - a really revealing portrait of the family under pressure.
Well worth reading.
July 14, 2012
If they'd have Facebook and internet message boards in 1935, this is what they'd have been writing about. Wonderful social history - such an interesting and moving book.
May 10, 2024
What an unexpected gem. The title and cover makes it look like the most maudlin martyrish type of weepy; I wouldn't even have scanned the blurb had the pickings in the community book box not been so slim.
In actual fact, it's a collection of the real letters of the Co-operative Correspondence Club; a group of women who wrote round-robin letters from 1935 to the late 70s. Their letters cover all sorts of topics - cheering along with other passengers as their bus heroically crept through the great smog of London, waiting overnight in a damp sleeping bag to see the coronation of the queen, taking in evacuees and eating a strained supper pretending that the smoking wreck of german bomber couldn't be seen out of the window, watching the opening night of her own play, appearing on Panorama, watching children and partners die, and slowly accepting that their own time on Earth is over.
The women come from all sorts of backgrounds and from all over the UK - but members were only added on recommendation that they could write regularly and well. The accounts are fresh, written vividly, and written only for the eyes of friends. They're absolutely fascinating.
In actual fact, it's a collection of the real letters of the Co-operative Correspondence Club; a group of women who wrote round-robin letters from 1935 to the late 70s. Their letters cover all sorts of topics - cheering along with other passengers as their bus heroically crept through the great smog of London, waiting overnight in a damp sleeping bag to see the coronation of the queen, taking in evacuees and eating a strained supper pretending that the smoking wreck of german bomber couldn't be seen out of the window, watching the opening night of her own play, appearing on Panorama, watching children and partners die, and slowly accepting that their own time on Earth is over.
The women come from all sorts of backgrounds and from all over the UK - but members were only added on recommendation that they could write regularly and well. The accounts are fresh, written vividly, and written only for the eyes of friends. They're absolutely fascinating.
May 13, 2021
This is a hidden gem. It is like sitting down to tea with your grandmother, if she was British, born in 1900, more educated than any woman in my family, and unabashedly honest about her life. I learned so much and connected with the universal themes of being a woman, being in a long partnership, and dealing with family, children, illness, etc. These women are so curious, motivated, and raw. I highly recommend.
April 10, 2024
Darn kids and their social media…
Babe.
Humans have always been social. And when we didn’t have the technology to stay connected - we made it.
In 1935, young mothers were isolated and desperately lonely, so they created a deeply personal SECRET magazine, just for themselves. Here we read their advice, questions, stories, and - most importantly - friendship, an emotional intimacy spanning years and countries.
Babe.
Humans have always been social. And when we didn’t have the technology to stay connected - we made it.
In 1935, young mothers were isolated and desperately lonely, so they created a deeply personal SECRET magazine, just for themselves. Here we read their advice, questions, stories, and - most importantly - friendship, an emotional intimacy spanning years and countries.
February 25, 2019
I really enjoyed this very interesting and insightful book! It was wonderful and heartwarming to find the same, familiar emotions and experiences translating to the present day. I also saw lots of surprising, striking parallels between the experiences/relationships between a group of women of different backgrounds and how things are with social media today.
August 14, 2020
I absolutely loved this book. Based on archive material held in the Mass Observation Archive it shares the work of a group of remarkable women who set up a magazine amongst themselves. Jenna Bailey has done an amazing job pulling the material together and it is a privilege to read about the lives of these women.
July 5, 2020
This was a fascinating book, basically a collection of letters sent between women from the 1930s until the 1980s, spanning life with young children all the way up to old age. It's a brilliant slice of social history and shows that we often worry about the same things now as we did 50 years ago.
October 14, 2017
It's fun to know how mothers using "social media" of that time to know how to caring their kids.
May 25, 2019
Read years ago. Loved it. One of my favourites.
June 18, 2022
A fascinating insight into the lives of a small group of women at an interesting time of change for the roles of women in the uk in the 20th century.
January 31, 2024
Loved it, such a great preservation of 60 years of history, poignant and personal.
August 4, 2024
A fascinating insight into everyday (albeit middle class) women's lives in the 1930's, 40's and 50's. What a wonderful gift to the nation from the women of the Confidential Correspondence Club.
April 5, 2013
Social networking isn’t really that new and it doesn’t require digital technology.
In 1935, a group of disparate women from across the UK set up the Co-operative Correspondence Club. For nearly 60 years, the members submitted articles to an editor, who stitched them together into the sole copy of the club’s fortnightly magazine. The magazine was circulated around the membership, who added marginal comments as it went around.
The title of this book refers to the original letter in Nursery World magazine, where a young mother wrote about her loneliness and want of intellectual stimulation. A number of women replied in kind and that is how the idea for the club started.
Amazingly, the club kept going for 60 years, until the remaining membership became too old and frail to carry on. This book provides a selection of the club’s output, taken from the few surviving files.
I do love this kind of social history, which is very similar to some of the material from the mass observation archive, though it has a more personal touch of course. The past really is a foreign country and I am always amazed to read how different things were for women even in my own country just a few decades ago.
And the parallels between the way their relationships developed and modern social networking really are striking. So it’s quite apt that I’m writing this the day before I travel to York for the 10th anniversary party of http://www.asdfriendly.org which provides such a lifeline of information and friendship to families across the UK affected by autism.
A lovely little book and a quick and easy read; I definitely recommend it.
In 1935, a group of disparate women from across the UK set up the Co-operative Correspondence Club. For nearly 60 years, the members submitted articles to an editor, who stitched them together into the sole copy of the club’s fortnightly magazine. The magazine was circulated around the membership, who added marginal comments as it went around.
The title of this book refers to the original letter in Nursery World magazine, where a young mother wrote about her loneliness and want of intellectual stimulation. A number of women replied in kind and that is how the idea for the club started.
Amazingly, the club kept going for 60 years, until the remaining membership became too old and frail to carry on. This book provides a selection of the club’s output, taken from the few surviving files.
I do love this kind of social history, which is very similar to some of the material from the mass observation archive, though it has a more personal touch of course. The past really is a foreign country and I am always amazed to read how different things were for women even in my own country just a few decades ago.
And the parallels between the way their relationships developed and modern social networking really are striking. So it’s quite apt that I’m writing this the day before I travel to York for the 10th anniversary party of http://www.asdfriendly.org which provides such a lifeline of information and friendship to families across the UK affected by autism.
A lovely little book and a quick and easy read; I definitely recommend it.
August 5, 2011
Can any mother help me? is the first line in a letter that appeared in the British mom's magazine The Nursery World in 1935 and was a plea from an educated woman stranded at home with young children in rural Ireland. Her letter drew many sympathetic replies and lead to the Cooperative Corespondence Club which, for almost 50 years, produced a bimonthly private magazine written for and by its readers. The single copy, assembled by the editor (pen name Ad Astra), passed by post from reader to reader, gaining sympathetic marginal notes as it went. Jenna Bailey found an archive of old CCC material while writing her Master's thesis and chased up some of the authors, a few of whom were still alive: this book is result. It is deeply engaging and humane: the authors all have distinct, lively voices and recount their lives in such vivid detail that by the time I reached the final chapters, where old age, infirmity and death began to overtake CCC's members and their spouses that I found myself in tears.
A reviewer from the Observer makes a fine summary: "A remarkable opportunity to indulge in that most human of pleasures, eavesdropping. And to confirm the truth of that most well-worn of clichés, that there is no such thing as an ordinary life"
A reviewer from the Observer makes a fine summary: "A remarkable opportunity to indulge in that most human of pleasures, eavesdropping. And to confirm the truth of that most well-worn of clichés, that there is no such thing as an ordinary life"
June 3, 2008
The story of a correspondence club originally formed by a disparate group of mothers in the 1930s. The club continued until the 1980s, when the members became too few and/or too ill to continue.
Jenna Bailey came on the story of this group of women, initially strangers, who became friends through their writing when looking for a Masters research topic. What she found was the story of connections formed through shared joys and sorrows, and evidence of the strength that can be found in women's friendships, even those formed over great distances.
An interesting study of the value of asynchronous relationships and friendships for those involved. Invites comparison with modern online asychronous relationships and how they are valued.
Jenna Bailey came on the story of this group of women, initially strangers, who became friends through their writing when looking for a Masters research topic. What she found was the story of connections formed through shared joys and sorrows, and evidence of the strength that can be found in women's friendships, even those formed over great distances.
An interesting study of the value of asynchronous relationships and friendships for those involved. Invites comparison with modern online asychronous relationships and how they are valued.
Read
July 30, 2011Loved it. I really felt I knew some of the writers by the end of the book, or what they chose to reveal of themselves anyway. Some parts provoked strong emotions; particularly the sections about illness and ageing. What a committment the women had to the magazine and to each other; some writing for over half a century!
I asked for this book for Christmas as I'd seen the stage version (same title as the book in case you want to see it too) and wanted to gain a fuller picture.
I have just looked into writing for MO.
I asked for this book for Christmas as I'd seen the stage version (same title as the book in case you want to see it too) and wanted to gain a fuller picture.
I have just looked into writing for MO.
January 27, 2015
Een facebook groepje voor intelligente moeders, maar dan voor dat internet bestond, daarmee kun je deze groep vrouwen vergelijken. Opmerkelijk hoe ze zo'n vijftig jaar met elkaar communiceerden, aan de hand van een tijdschrift dat ze zelf aanvulden en aan elkaar doorzonden. Het boek bevat een selectie van hun brieven aan elkaar, die een mooi beeld geven van hoe het was om een huismoeder met een diploma te zijn, zo'n 50 jaar geleden.
January 3, 2008
I dipped into this book rather than read it straight through. Fascinating slice of social history that tells the story of several women who correspondended with each other via a magazine from the 1930s to the 1980s. So interesting to see how they coped with motherhood and it's demands, their attitudes to marriage, family and work.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 50 reviews