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First edition of Journalism for Women: A Practical Guide Journalism for Women, published in 1898 and succeeded later that year by his first novel A Man from the North, is the first of Bennett’s many self-help books. Bennett – here still designated ‘E.A.’ – was well-qualified to comment on this topic. Following his first job in London as solicitor’s clerk he was appointed assistant editor at Woman magazine, later rising to the position of editor before resigning in 1900 to become a full-time writer. The particular faults he observes in the female hack include unreliability and ‘a slipshod style’. Bennett pulls no punches in his pronouncements on the failings of lady journalists, but this early work nevertheless displays a relatively progressive attitude towards gender equality. He attributes these unfortunate deficiencies not to the innate inferiority of the female sex, nor even to essential differences between the sexes, but rather to the social conditioning which trained women for a less exacting domestic role. |