Tuesday, January 8, 2008

The Hoop Skirt

A Whoop About Hoops

For when a smitten wretch has seen
Among the lost in crinoline,
The one his heart holds dearer,
Oh! what a chill to ardent passion,
To feel that through this hollow fashion
He never can be nearer!

That instead of timidity drawing near,
And pouring into her thrilling ear
The flood of his soul's devotion,
He must stand and bellow in thunder tones,
Across half an acre of skirts and bones,
As if hailing a ship on the ocean.


This poem is from an 1857 issue of Harper's Weekly.It's from a book called The Wonderful World of Ladies Fashion(1850-1920) Edited by Joseph Schroeder,Jr that I took out of the library.Not everyone liked the hoop skirt as there were many cartoons and poems deriding it that appeared at the time.This poem is quite representative of the critics.

5 comments:

Ana said...

This poem is so funny, but probably true. :) Thanks for posting it, it made me giggle.

Sara N. Smith said...

I've enjoyed browsing through your blog and reading your thoughts!
God bless always!

Ana said...

Robert~
On a completely different subject than what your post is ... Did you watch Persuasion last night? If so, had you seen that "version" before. And also, if you've seen that one before did they leave a lot of the movie out to fit it into the TV time frame? I'm just wondering because I had a friend who told me that the movie she saw followed the book perfectly and watching the movie I noticed that it almost followed it perfectly but some parts of the book were left out and I was wondering if they cut them out to fit on the TV. Anyway, maybe you don't know and I'm just rambling. :) Thank you again for the list of times for the Jane movies!

Miriam N. said...

What a funny poem! A different viewpoint of the hoopskirt.


Ana,
I saw this version of Persuasion, and they did leave out some parts.
They did cut a couple of scenes for the TV, but they were scenes that weren't really in the book.
I thought they did a really good job on it, though.

Ana said...

Miriam Rebekah~
Thank you for your information. :) I greatly appreciate it.