Gissing declares that 'the female sex'Ĭannot be raised from its then low level withoutĪsceticism, a revolt against sexual instinct. In marriage relations and in the education of The Odd Women is a powerfully expressed plea for intelligence and truth

Gissing's obdurate realism is very much to the fore here. Earlier in the novel (Chapter 6), Rhoda herself had laid much of the blame for such miserable outcomes not so much on the individual concerned, but on novelists who corrupt their readers with the sentimental notion of love. Everard, whose own reputation is questionable, is attracted to Rhoda and sets himself to divert her from her chosen path, talking harshly both of vapid women who make for unequal and unhappy marriages, and the men who enter unsatisfactory relationships with them. Having dealt with the weaknesses in the novel, Swinnerton first quotes from Everard Barfoot in Chapter 9 of the novel. In this respect, Swinnerton sees Gissing as another school of critics have seen him - as a 'proto-feminist' (Chase 231). Through her, as Swinnerton shows, Gissing analyses the causes of women's inadequacies, and lends his support to the growing call to remedy them by education and training. But he does admire the novel's central character, the spirited Rhoda Nunn, who has decided to dedicate herself to preparing single women to lead an independent and meaningful life. He would certainly have understood why some find Gissing misogynistic (see Chase 231 and 243, notes 1 and 2). He is quite harshly critical of Gissing's The Odd Women, finding the choice of title heavy-handed, the women characters 'mostly repulsive' (106), the men no better, and the ending depressing.

His book on George Gissing is a very much a critical biography. The author of many novels, he was also an essayist, literary critic and biographer, and, for many years, associated with major publishers - first with Dent, and then for much longer with Chatto and Windus. Frank Swinnerton (1884-1982) was a prolific writer.

The Odd Women by George Gissing