Laura's Review Bookshelf: The Body at the Tower Blog Tour!

I'd like to personally thank YS Lee for stopping at the Review Bookshelf and talking to us about Notorious Victorians (sounds dirty, no?). I completely adore this series and my review will be up sometime later today. But for now, here is Ms. Lee!

Welcome to the Body at the Tower blog tour, the theme of which is Notorious Victorians. Today and tomorrow I’ll be talking about rebels – women who flouted conventions of gender and class to make a lasting impact on our daily lives. Today’s rebel is Florence Nightingale – yes, the pioneer of nursing.

It may be difficult to imagine anything radical or rebellious about nursing: it’s a caring profession, a primarily female one nowadays, and a sensible, traditional choice. But in 1844, when Nightingale announced that she wanted to become a nurse, her mother and sister were distraught. It simply wasn’t done. Her family was too rich, too respectable, and Nightingale hadn’t been raised for this. (The Nightingales weren’t entirely dreary: Florence was born in Italy and named for the city of her birth – a very unusual choice for the time. The same principle applied to Nightingale’s sister, Parthenope!) Nightingale encountered huge resistance as she studied to become a nurse. She even rejected marriage proposals, for fear that marriage would hinder her work.

The Crimean War was the first war to be covered by journalists and photographers in anything like a modern style. When reports made their way to London about the appalling conditions under which wounded soldiers suffered, Nightingale found her focus. In 1854, she led a group of volunteer nurses to Turkey. They began by giving sufficient food and medicine to the wounded, and introduced adequate sanitation in the field hospitals. The effect was remarkable.

Some conservative elements disapproved of Nightingale’s presence: it was unladylike to work, and immodest to treatment to injured males. But public opinion was generally positive, and many generous donations enabled Nightingale to establish the first professional school of nursing. Nightingale’s long and exceptionally productive professional life stands as a vindication of her calling; a justification of her startling and rebellious early decision to get her hands dirty and challenge the typical pattern of the rich young lady.

Check out the next installment of the tour at The Book Smugglers.

Below you can check out former tour stops as well.

Tour stops: