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What if marriage offers escape from poverty, but leaves too little room for freedom?
In London in the early 1890s, the Madden sisters face life with almost no money after a comfortable childhood. Monica works in a draper's shop and longs for ease. Edmund Widdowson can offer security, but his wish to protect a wife comes with a desire to keep her close.
Elsewhere, Rhoda Nunn and Mary Barfoot train young women for office work and argue for a life beyond marriage. When Mary's cousin Everard takes an interest in Rhoda, conviction meets attraction. In The Odd Women, George Gissing brings questions of income, independence and love into lives where every choice has a cost.
What you’ll discover
- Freedom with a cost Follow women weighing the need for security against the wish to direct their own lives.
- Rhoda's firm convictions Meet an independent teacher whose views on marriage face the pressure of personal attraction.
- Work as a way forward Enter a school where office training offers young women another path through life.
- Money behind every choice See how an income, or its absence, shapes courtship, hope and the limits of choice.
- No easy answers Hear competing views given room in a calm, exact story of loneliness and pride.
Who will love it
Readers who enjoy Victorian novels about ordinary lives, who care about work, money and marriage, and who like characters who argue, hope and change their minds.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- Love leaves the daughters unprepared
- Poverty narrows the sisters' lives
- Rhoda offers practical help
- Work offers a life beyond marriage
- Monica chooses security over love
- Rhoda's feelings test her principles
- A husband's devotion becomes control
- Contrasts reveal the cost of custom
- Independence must be learned and supported
Who’s who
- Rhoda NunnA sharp, proud teacher of typing who champions unmarried working women and has resolved never to marry herself.
- Monica MaddenThe youngest Madden sister, pretty and warm, who wants a gentler life than the shop counter gives her.
- Alice MaddenThe eldest sister, a worn governess who clings to respectability and to the small savings that keep her from the workhouse.
- Virginia MaddenThe second sister, a delicate companion who dreams of independence and takes comfort wherever she can find it.
- Mary BarfootA dignified woman of private means who runs a school that trains educated young women for office work.
- Everard BarfootMary's charming cousin, back from abroad, who loves pleasure and wants to understand Rhoda Nunn.
- Edmund WiddowsonA lonely, wealthy, solemn gentleman who wants a wife entirely his own and cannot bear to share her.
- Mildred VesperA prim, dry-witted worker at Miss Barfoot's school who shares a room with Monica and is content with simple things.
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The Odd Women
by George Gissing · 1893
Three surviving sisters face poverty in London while Rhoda Nunn trains women to need no husband.
Medium level5–10 hours to read20 languages
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In short
What happens to a woman when nobody has taught her how to earn a living? George Gissing asks that question in The Odd Women, a novel of 1893.
The Odd Women at a glance
- Reading time
- About 9 h 10 min7 h 15 min fast, 10 h 55 min slow
- Length
- 131,200 words
- Library level
- Medium longer sentences, everyday words
- First published
- 1893by George Gissing
Reading time at 238 words a minute (fast 300, slow 200). How long the classics take to read · Updated
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A kind father leaves six daughters unprepared
The book opens in 1872 on the downs above Clevedon. Dr Madden, a gentle widower, tells his eldest daughter Alice that he will at last insure his life for a thousand pounds. After twenty years of work he has saved almost nothing.
The doctor loves poetry more than medicine. He reads Tennyson aloud and believes women should never be troubled by sordid matters, so he has never trained a single girl for a career. At tea a guest named Rhoda Nunn, fifteen and eager, says plainly that she will have to earn her living. The doctor answers with a joke and turns the talk to a nightingale.
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Details
- First published
- 1893
- Language
- English
- Reading time
- 10 h 15 min
- Level
- Medium level
Cite this edition
Gissing, George. The Odd Women. Library of Alexandria, 2026, libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-odd-women.
Gissing, G. (2026). The odd women. Library of Alexandria. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-odd-women (Original work published 1893)
Gissing, George. The Odd Women. Library of Alexandria, 2026. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-odd-women.
@book{gissing2026odd,
author = {Gissing, George},
title = {The Odd Women},
publisher = {Library of Alexandria},
year = {2026},
url = {https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-odd-women},
note = {First published 1893}
}
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What is The Odd Women about?
It follows the Madden sisters, left nearly penniless after their father's death, and the women of a London school who train others for office work. It looks at marriage, money and independence in Victorian England.
What does the title The Odd Women mean?
Rhoda Nunn uses it for the half million or so women in England who outnumber the men and so cannot all marry. She sees them not as wasted lives but as a reserve for useful work.
When was The Odd Women written and is it a true story?
George Gissing published it in 1893. The characters are invented, but the wages, working hours, rents and attitudes toward women's work reflect real conditions in London in the 1880s.
The author
George Gissing
1857–1903 · English novelist
George Gissing was an English novelist born in Wakefield in 1857. He lived in London and later in France, where he died in 1903. He wrote New Grub Street, published in 1891, The Odd Women, published in 1893, and The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft, published in 1903.
“To make women hard-hearted.”
More by George Gissing
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