Marie Stopes

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Standard Name: Stopes, Marie
Birth Name: Marie Charlotte Carmichael Stopes
Pseudonym: Mark Arundel
Pseudonym: Erica Fay
Pseudonym: Marie Carmichael
Pseudonym: G. N. Mortlake
MS was best known for her early-twentieth-century writing on motherhood and birth control, and for her strong commitment to educating women in the practice of contraception. In order to communicate detailed instructions on topics that were taboo, she often employed a literary style that may now seem over-mystical or lyrical. She published widely, writing in various disciplines such as science, sexology, philosophy and theology, in a number of literary genres such as drama, autobiography, poetry, and the novel, and on a wide range of topics, including censorship, love, and marriage.
Black and white, head-and-shoulders photograph of Marie Stopes, c. 1918. She has short curly hair, and wears a dress with dark sleeves and broad white collar, a necklace of large beads, and a white Panama-style hat with a dark bow.

Connections

Connections Author name Excerpt
Cultural formation Charlotte Stopes
Though little is known about her early religious experiences, she brought up her daughters as members of the Free Church of Scotland .
Commire, Anne, and Deborah Klezmer, editors. Women in World History: A Biographical Encyclopedia. Yorkin Publications, 1999–2002, 17 vols.
850
According to her daughter Marie , CS raised them in the...
Education Diana Athill
DA was taught at home by governesses (seven successively before she was sent to school), who followed a correspondence course designed for home schooling which was known as Parents Educational National Union . A French...
Education Fay Weldon
FW learned to read at three: I remember . . . the way the letters suddenly made sense.
Weldon, Fay. Auto da Fay. Flamingo, 2002.
24
After her grandmother joined the family in 1942 she was able to borrow adult books from...
Family and Intimate relationships Naomi Mitchison
The marriage endured, though NM had several years of unenjoyable sex before she discovered Marie Stopes 's Married Love. When the couple were apart they normally wrote to each other every day (or every...
Family and Intimate relationships Kate Clanchy
While the family was in Edinburgh, KC 's mother, Joan Clanchy , was the Headmistress of St George's School for Girls (which numbers Ménie Muriel Dowie among its distinguished former students).
Scott, Jane. “By Virtue Of An Explosive Arts Debut”. The Herald, 30 Dec. 1996.
When KC 's...
Family and Intimate relationships Margaret Forster
From about the time she entered her teens, MF was haunted by the determination that her life should not be like what she saw as the empty, monotonous lives of her mother and her aunts...
Family and Intimate relationships Charlotte Stopes
CS bore her daughter, Marie Stopes , the future scientist and sex reformer.
Stephen, Sir Leslie, and Sidney Lee, editors. The Dictionary of National Biography. Smith, Elder, 1908–2024, 22 vols. plus supplements.
Friends, Associates Muriel Spark
For the next few years she lived the stimulating, bohemian, often harsh life of a modern poet in London, though she despised those literary circles which she felt to be self-serving and amateurish. Although she...
Friends, Associates Phyllis Bentley
Vera Brittain introduced PB , during her stay in Chelsea, to birth-control crusader Marie Stopes .
Brittain, Vera. Chronicle of Friendship. Editor Bishop, Alan, Gollancz, 1986.
41
Friends, Associates Angela Brazil
Visiting Polperro in Cornwall, AB introduced herself by letter to Marie Stopes , on the excuse that they shared the same publisher, Blackie .
Freeman, Gillian. The Schoolgirl Ethic: The Life and Work of Angela Brazil. Allen Lane, 1976.
128
Friends, Associates Naomi Mitchison
Naomi's close childhood friends included Julian and Aldous Huxley . Close family friends included Florence Buchanan , distinguished physiologist, and Marie Stopes , paleobotanist and birth control educator (the latter role emerged only later).
Squier, Susan M., and Naomi Mitchison. “Naomi Mitchison: The Feminist Art of Making Things Difficult”. Solution Three, Feminist Press at The City University of New York, 1995, pp. 161-83.
164
Benton, Jill. Naomi Mitchison: A Biography. Pandora, 1992.
22
Intertextuality and Influence Maude Royden
She had originally given the first seven of the eleven chapters as addresses at Kensington Town Hall on a series of consecutive Sunday nights.
Royden, Maude. Sex and Common-Sense. G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1922.
xv
This was the same year in which Marie Stopes formed...
Leisure and Society Angela Brazil
AC often entertained school-children and orphans at her home. She suggests a different slant on the eugenics movement when describing this activity to Marie Stopes : A spinster lady can't do much in your line...
Occupation Charlotte Stopes
After completing her education, she taught privately. CS was also her daughter Marie 's primary educator until Marie reached the age of twelve.
Blain, Virginia et al., editors. The Feminist Companion to Literature in English: Women Writers from the Middle Ages to the Present. Yale University Press; Batsford, 1990.
Commire, Anne, and Deborah Klezmer, editors. Women in World History: A Biographical Encyclopedia. Yorkin Publications, 1999–2002, 17 vols.
850
Occupation Muriel Spark
She later recounted the ructions that cost her her Poetry Society job. She set out to raise the quality of the Poetry Review, to cease railing against the moderns,
Spark, Muriel. Curriculum Vitae: Autobiography. Constable, 1992.
169
to render an amateur...

Timeline

April 1900: Shafts, a paper for women and the working...

Building item

April 1900

Shafts, a paper for women and the working classes, then a magazine of progressive thought, ceased publication.
Doughan, David, and Denise Sanchez. Feminist Periodicals, 1855-1984. Harvester Press, 1987.
16
Harrison, Royden et al. The Warwick Guide to British Labour Periodicals, 1790-1970: A Check List. Harvester Press, 1977.
492

By September 1915: US birth-control activist Margaret Sanger...

Building item

By September 1915

US birth-control activist Margaret Sanger probably showed Marie Stopes (as a French pessary) an example of the original contraceptive cap of the kind dating from 1838.
Greer, Germaine. Sex and Destiny. Harper and Row, 1984.
135, 136
American National Biography. http://www.anb.org/articles/home.html.

16 October 1916: Margaret Sanger opened a birth-control clinic...

National or international item

16 October 1916

Margaret Sanger opened a birth-control clinic at 46 Amboy Street in New York (Brooklyn), four and a half years ahead of the first such British clinic, which was the brainchild of Marie Stopes .
American National Biography. http://www.anb.org/articles/home.html.
“On this Day, September 7, 1966”. The New York Times, 7 Sept. 1966.

1929: The Society for Constructive Birth Control...

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1929

The Society for Constructive Birth Control and Racial Progress (founded by Marie Stopes in August 1921) began to advocate sterilization in certain cases where women were congenitally diseased, physically or mentally handicapped, or had previous...

1930: A number of rival birth-control clinics joined...

Building item

1930

A number of rival birth-control clinics joined forces as the National Birth Control Association (later the Family Planning Association).
Greer, Germaine. Sex and Destiny. Harper and Row, 1984.
136

31 July 1930: Memorandum 153/MCW, a clause introduced by...

Building item

31 July 1930

Memorandum 153/MCW, a clause introduced by the Ministry of Health, first allowed dispensation of contraceptive advice.
Brookes, Barbara. Abortion in England: 1900-1967. Croom Helm, 1988.
67
Ledbetter, Rosanna. A History of the Malthusian League: 1877-1927. Ohio State University Press, 1976.
228

2 June 1942: The criminal trial by jury of Dr Eustace...

Building item

2 June 1942

The criminal trial by jury of Dr Eustace Chesser for his educational book Love without Fear began; he was charged with publishing an obscene libel.
Craig, Alec. The Banned Books of England and Other Countries. George Allen and Unwin, 1962.
99-105

1991: RU 486, the morning after pill, was approved...

National or international item

1991

RU 486, the morning after pill, was approved for use in the UK.
Asbell, Bernard. The Pill: A Biography of the Drug that Changed the World. Random House, 1995.
352

Texts

Stopes, Marie. A Journal from Japan. 1st ed., Blackie and Son, 1910.
Stopes, Marie. A Letter to Working Mothers. 1st ed., Printed for the author.
Stopes, Marie. A New Gospel to All Peoples. Arthur L. Humphreys, 1922.
Stopes, Marie. A Road to Fairyland. 1st ed., G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1926.
Stopes, Marie. Ancient Plants. 1st ed., Blackie and Son, 1910.
Stopes, Marie, editor. Birth Control News. John Bale, Sons, and Danielsson.
Stopes, Marie. Don’t Tell Timothy. 1st ed., G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1925.
Stopes, Marie, and Kenrio Watanabe. Love Letters of a Japanese. Editor Stopes, Marie, 1st ed., Stanley Paul and Company, 1919.
Stopes, Marie. Love Songs for Young Lovers. 1st ed., William Heinemann.
Stopes, Marie. Love’s Creation. 1st ed., John Bale, Sons and Danielsson, 1928.
Stopes, Marie. Man, Other Poems and a Preface. 1st ed., William Heinemann, 1914.
Stopes, Marie. Married Love. 1st ed., A. C. Fifield.
Stopes, Marie. Mother England. 1st ed., John Bale, Sons and Danielsson.
Stopes, Marie. Radiant Motherhood. 1st ed., G. Putnam’s Sons.
Stopes, Marie, editor. The Sportophyte. 4 vols.
Stopes, Marie. Vectia. 1st ed., John Bale, Sons and Danielsson, 1926.
Stopes, Marie. We Burn. 1st ed., De La More Press, 1949.
Stopes, Marie. Wise Parenthood. 1st ed., A. C. Fifield.