Seeing Through Spectacles

Abstract

Between 1906 and 1914, the Woman Suffrage Movement in London produced aseries of public spectacles designed to bring the suffrage cause to the attention of politicians and citizens. During this same period, daily newspapers designed for mass reading surpassed in sales the older, class-based newspapers. A survey of stories and photographs published in the mass pressreveals how the press and the movement collaborated in bringing to readersa new sense of urban life as restless, dynamic and forward moving. Catering to reader and spectator curiosity – a disinterested and ambiguous form of post-Enlightenment attention – the press and themovement strengthened each other’s intent to capture the eyes and minds of a city fascinated by its own image.