Martin Kettle (How the past can help us reach across political divides, 27 December) hits the nail on the head. Yes, in her own lifetime, Christabel Pankhurst was the historically more important Pankhurst sister in the suffragette movement than Sylvia, a point I emphasise in my recent book Christabel Pankhurst: A Biography.
Sylvia is an icon of the left and rightly admired. But to cast Christabel and their mother Emmeline aside, because they were separatist feminists who wanted to unite all women and not ally the suffragette movement to any of the male-dominated political parties of the day, is problematic.
The suffragette movement in Edwardian Britain included women of differing political persuasions and social classes. Both Christabel and Emmeline were committed to the women’s suffrage cause rather than party politics. The history of first-wave feminism is much messier than all too often presented.
The left does not own feminism, although it does like to celebrate and inflate Sylvia’s importance, which is why, I presume, we have recently had two articles about her and none about Christabel nor Emmeline.
June Purvis
University of Portsmouth
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