Two Nonconformist Women Printers and Booksellers in the Mid-Eighteenth Century

• Published in: Bunyan studies no. 24; pp. 65 - 84
• Main Author: McNaught, Alison
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Newcastle Upon Tyne Northumbria University, Department of Humanities, Faculty of Arts, Design and Social Sciences 01.01.2020
• Subjects: 18th century; 19th century; Case studies; Censorship; Committees; Imprisonment; Literacy; Printers; Publishing industry; Quakers; Religion; Society; Women
• ISSN: 0954-0970

In turn, support from Nonconformist individuals and denominations was a critical element to their own survival at a time when increasing pressure from industrialisation and social responses to the gendering of domestic, private and public spheres began to exclude women from the literary market place. The consolidation of capital within printers and booksellers of substance resulted in a subsequent loss of roles for women, and threatened their status in the book trade. [...]it supports recent research showing that there were many independent women at work in London supporting the luxury goods trade around the Cheapside area between St Paul's and the Royal Exchange, the same area that was at the centre of the book trade.5 These women were all members of London's livery companies like the women booksellers discussed here, with whom they had much in common, since they too ran their own businesses, before marriage, during, and as widows.6 Whatever their exact financial status, these women printers and booksellers from the 'middling sort' demonstrated they had sufficient business acumen, education and literacy to perform their work to the same standards as men, whilst they maintained the affection, support and respect of their families, the book trade and their Nonconformist communities. A description of the committee's role is recorded in the minutes of the Morning Meeting, where it is reported that they have read through Tho' Hopkins manuscript and the places marked by them were viewed and corrected in the meeting, and the meet confirms it be printed if the Author be satisfied with the Corrections and Thomas Raylton to advise him.17 This reveals not only Raylton's advisory role but also the method that the committee used to control the Friends' message.