NEW WOMAN

New Woman: translation

The British idea of the "progressive" modern woman appeared on the London stage in Sydney Grundy's comedy titledThe New Woman(1894). The eponymous heroine ofDavidBelasco'sThe Girl of the Golden West(1905) is sometimes signaled as the American version of the "new woman," although the concept traces back to the earlier woman suffrage movement as well as to the 1890s craze for bicycle riding and other physical recreations newly available to women. Like most actresses, the women playwrights associated with theProvincetown Playersin the 1910s would be considered "new women," whether or not such women figured prominently as characters in their plays.

See alsoIbsen, Henrik; Shaw, George Bernard.