Clemence Dane and Good Housekeeping Modernity and Common Reading

Clemence Dane and Good Housekeepin Modernity and Common Reading examines Danes tenure as a literary critic for Good Housekeeping between 1923 and 1933, firmly locating it within a vibrant interwar periodical culture. By expressing confidence in a shared literary heritage, modelling enjoyment of a wide variety of literature and linking womens reading habits to the revitalisation of national literary culture, Danes serial essays implicitly challenged academic and modernist approaches to literature. Moreover, Danes monthly book pages, in dialogue with book authors and with other feminist contributors, fulfilled and exceeded Good Housekeepings mission by preparing women for their new responsibilities as British citizens. Danes journalism sheds new light on the heterogeneity intrinsic to quality domestic magazines and the roles they played in fostering womens multi-faceted modern identities. Stella Deen demonstrates that Danes corpus of Good Housekeeping essays makes a significant contribution to the conceptualisation of the common reader and to the history of twentieth-century literary criticism.