Gypsy Creams
Your First Warning
Woman's Weekly / 7th May 1965
Well, as regular readers know, I’ve had my differences with Mary Marryat, but she’s quite capable of good advice sometimes, and so it is here. Obviously, the ‘sharp things’ are a telling indication of the age in which the letter was written, and it’s curious that the writer doesn’t connect those comments with the plight of her poor sister, and her feeling that she is somehow responsible for informing a potential partner of her family’s ‘moral failings’. Mary is quite right to remark that for every unmarried mother, there is a father, but I would go a bit further than that, and suggest that the writer has had her first warning that her suitor is, frankly, something of a judgemental arsehole, who appears to be unaware that women can’t get pregnant on their own.
Tags: Mary Marryat, misplaced morality, pregnancy, problem page
RedScharlach on 16 April 2012 @ 10am
I’m fascinated by the parents who want to put accents on the name Marie (Marïé? Maríè? Marîê?), mainly because I’d forgotten there was any other way to say Marie until Mary mentioned Marie Lloyd. Shame she didn’t suggest Ma-REEEEEE! as an alternative spelling.