These days, reading is a girl-coded activity. I haven’t done any deliberate gender curation here — paintings and illustrations of women and girls with books, (love) letters and magazines are simply far more common. However, you will find far more men (fathers) reading newspapers.
Reading wasn’t always considered an activity ‘for girls’.
Swati Moitra explains how reading can be a subversive and even revolutionary act in certain socio-historical contexts. She draws especially from her own work in the history of women’s reading practices in nineteenth and early twentieth century India, in particular the region of Bengal. She talks about the dual indices of literacy and pleasure in her work, and its affiliations to fields like book history and print cultural studies.
Why and how is fiction important to women? In Why Women Read Fiction: The Stories of Our Lives (Oxford University Press, 2020), Helen Taylor, Emeritus Professor of English at the University of Exeter, explores this question to give a detailed and engaging picture of fiction in women’s lives. The book presents women’s narratives about fiction, interpretations of key texts, and perspectives on writers and the publishing industry. As the book makes clear, reading is not just another hobby for women, as it occupies a crucial role in women’s lives. Full of examples and women’s stories of how reading matters, discussions of gender and genre, the role of women as authors, along with analysis of book clubs and literary festivals, the book is essential reading across the humanities, social sciences, and for anyone interested in reading!
Psychologist & Educator Maryanne Wolf explains that our brain circuitry changes according to how we read, how we read changes according to how our brains are (re)wired, and that these changes are happening now and always.Nika Goltz (1925 ~ 2012) 1956 illustration for ‘The Little Witch’ by Otfried PreusslerWoman Reclining In Hammock With Parasol by Walter Crane1884 Godey’s Lady’s Book Fashion PlateCarlton Alfred Smith – Storytime 1897Johan Gudmundsen-Holmgreen (1858-1912) A Little Girl Reading, 1900Jessie Willcox Smith, 1905 Picture Books In WinterThe Artist’s Wife (1933) by Henry Lamb (Australian-British, 1883-1960). Pansy Pakenham (shown here) was a friend of Evelyn Waugh and Nancy MitfordJessie Willcox Smith (September 6, 1863 – May 3, 1935) Fairy TalesA Girl Reading Vanessa Bell (1879–1961)Young woman reading or Lady with Balcony Henri Ottmann (French 1877-1927)‘Vilma Reading on a Sofa’ by Tavik František Šimon (1887-1942) Polish artistInterior with Woman Reading in Sunlight. n.d Robert Panitzsch (Danish,1879–1949)‘The Report Post.’ (1945) Hannah Gluckstein’s painting of author Edith Heald while fire warden at Steyning, Sussex‘Meditation’ by Ivan Olinsky (1878-1962)1923 Boys and Girls Of Book Land by Nora Archibald Smith Illustrated by Jesse Wilcox Smith Publisher David McKay Co Little WomenCover of the September 1931 issue of The American Girl Magazine. For all girls – published by the Girl ScoutsLiberty Magazine July 21 1934 easy recipesBEDTIME STORIES Little Golden Book #2 illustrated by Gustaf TenggrenMorgan Weistling, b.1964, CaliforniaHenri Lebasque (French painter) 1865-1937 Le Cannet, Madame Lebasque Reading in the Garden, c. 1922Nina Hamnett’s ‘Portrait of a Woman’ (1917)Jessie Willcox Smith (1863-1935) women and girl readingAlice in Wonderland (c.1879) by George Dunlop Leslie (English, 1835–1921)‘Girl in Grey,’ (1943) Louis le BrocquyHarrison Fisher (1877–1934) an illustration from the American Sunday Monthly (1914)Honor Appleton (1879-1951)William-Adolphe BouguereauJan Catharinus Adriaan Goedhart (Dutch, 1893-1975) A young girl reading, 1929‘At the Breakfast Table.’ c1890s Carl Holsøe‘The Letter.’ (c1919) by Leo WhelanSaudade (Longing), by José Ferraz de Almeida Júnior, oil on carvas, 1899A Summer Afternoon by Robert Emil Stübner (German, 1874-1931)Sir Edward John Poynter (1836-1919), peintre britannique. Une soirée à la maison, 1888Winslow Homer (1836-1910) Boston, Massachusetts, Girl reading on a Stone Porch, 1872Robert Berény (1887-1953) Eta is readingWilliam McGregor Paxton. The Front Parlor, 1913Adrian Paul Allinson (1890-1959) British painter, potter and engraverOlga Della-Vos-Kardovskaya (1875-1952) Behind The Book 1918Russian artist Sergei Arsenievich Vinogradov (1869-1938). Woman with a book in the interior, 1915Zbigniew Pronaszko (Polish,1885-1958)Istvàn Szönyi (1894-1960, Hungarian painter)1908 Opvoeding van het kind, Education of the Child, Secessionist Style Dutch posterEdouard Vuillard (1868-1940) Madame Hessel in a red dress readingCarl Holsoe (1863-1935) The Artist’s Wife ReadingInterior of the Villa Maler (with reading lady on the veranda), ca.1930 by Carl Moll, AustrianGirl Reading by Harold Knight 1932Béla Czene (1911-1999) Fashion Magazine (In the Studio), 1969Nicolaas van der Waay (1855-1936, Dutch) Girl Reading A BookWalter MacEwen (American painter) 1860-1943 ‘Egmondse School’ of painting The Absent One On All Soul’s DayMarie Spartali Stillman – BeatriceCover of 1904 Opel catalog (1904) art nouveauFelix Vallotton‘Reading by Lamplight (Twilight Interior)’, George Clausen, oil on canvas, 1909Konrad Krzyzanowski (1872 – 1922) By Candlelight, 1914, National Museum, WarsawFelix VallottonThe house maid (1910) by William McGregor Paxton (American, 1869-1941)Elf Book Twilight Tales 1950 Rand McNallyWalter Beach Humphrey (American artist and illustrator) 1892 – 1966, ‘Memories’Finnish artist Helene Schjerfbeck, Girl Reading, 1904Armand POINT (1860-1932) was a French painter, engraver and designer who was associated with the Symbolist movement. This is ‘La Légende Dorée’ from 1897A Fireside Read by William Mulready c. 1825Edwin Harris (English, 1855 – 1906) By FirelightPeople’s Home Journal February 1906Peter Vilhelm Ilsted (1861–1933) Girl Reading a Letter in an Interior, 1908Nikolaï Bogdanov-Belski 1892 Reading The LetterJohn Everett Millais (1829-1896, British) The Violet’s Message 1854Thomas Benjamin Kennington – Reading the LetterNight Of The Letter by Dorothy EdenEdwin Georgi (1896-1964) impressionistic girls with bookInterior With A Woman Seen From The Back 1904 by Vilhelm Hammershoi (Danish 1864-1916)Carl Vilhelm Holsøe (Danish, 1863-1935) Lady in BlackCarl Vilhelm Holsöe (1863-1935, Danish) Reading By CandlelightThomas Cantrell Dugdale (1880 – 1952) The light of the fire. Well, someone was reading but then she fell asleep I guess.Liberty, January 18, 1930 art by Leslie ThrasherFrank Bramley RA (English 1857–1915) Delicious Solitude 1909Peder Severin Krøyer (Danish,1851-1909) Roses or The Artist’s Wife in the Garden at Skagen, 1902Illustration from a 1953 Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad calendarAlois Heinrich Priechenfried (1867-1953 Vienna, Austria)‘Attic Window.’ (1937) Noel Kilgour (Australian living in Pimlico)Irene Haas, illustration from A little House of Your Own, 1954Girls reading, 1939 by US photographer Dorothea LangeEugeni Forcano. Barcelona, 1957
Very small boys are not considered masculine yet so it’s acceptable for preschoolers to do girly things. So here, finally, is a picture of a boy with a book.
James Chapin (1887 – 1975, American) Child At WindowLeonid Zolotarev – The Snow Queen
Finally, a man with books.
Ilya Yefimovich Repin (Russian painter) 1844-1930Boy with Comic (1957) Joan EardleyJohn Ggnnam from a 1948 ad for Pacific SheetsEduard Swoboda 1814-1902Gauguin’s portrait of his son Clovis, 1885Reading at Supper (1957) Joan EardleyGeorg Friedrich KerstingFairfield Porter The Porch 1960s‘Picking Poindexter’, Richard Sargent, Saturday Evening Post, 1959
