2 results
AWKWARD APPENDAGES: COMIC UMBRELLAS IN NINETEENTH-CENTURY PRINT CULTURE
- Maria Damkjær
-
- Journal:
- Victorian Literature and Culture / Volume 45 / Issue 3 / September 2017
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 25 August 2017, pp. 475-492
-
- Article
- Export citation
-
In a letter “To the Editor of the Times,” a G. S. Hatton of Brompton writes furiously in May 1850:
Immediately, certain interpretive possibilities present themselves. I am sure most of my readers are struck by the possibility of bawdy jokes about an ejaculating umbrella; twenty-first-century eyes will struggle to unsee the “disgusting semi-fluid,” “propelled [as if] from a syringe” out of the tip of the leering gent's loathsome umbrella. Is Mr Hatton using the umbrella as a euphemism? If so, is that not a rather odd way of masking a sexual assault in a national newspaper? Or is this a literal account of an unpleasant occurrence? If this is truly what happened, how can we determine whether the outraged Mr Hatton was aware of the sexual connotations that present themselves so easily to us? Our modern inexorable sexual reading of the sticky umbrella stems from two circumstances: the very real sexual menace posed by a stranger who rubs himself against women's skirts in a public place (nothing funny about that), and more than a hundred years of being conditioned to notice, and snigger at, elongated objects. Since the popularisation of Sigmund Freud's theories of dream interpretation, the umbrella has been repeatedly interpreted as an unconscious substitution for the male genitals. Freud specifically mentioned umbrellas in his 1916–17 publication of A General Introduction to Psychoanalysis, along with trees, poles, firearms, pencils, nail files, etc. (Freud 154–55). It was perhaps this which led Katherine Mansfield to quip in 1917 of E. M. Forster's 1910 novel Howard's End that: “I can never be perfectly certain whether Helen was got with child by Leonard Bast or by his fatal forgotten umbrella. All things considered, I think it must have been the umbrella” (121). Mansfield's joke is on the umbrella as a phallic substitution. She equates Leonard's insecure grasp on middle-class respectability with a lack of sexual virility, while also casting aspersions on the probability of E. M. Forster's plot. But that is only half the joke. The other half of the joke is much older, that of the “fatal forgotten umbrella.” This refers back to a long tradition, as I shall show, of the unassuming umbrella as a catalyst, a plot engine with a will of its own which pitches its owner into social embarrassment, romantic entanglements or worse.[This afternoon] three ladies, a member of my family with two friends, visited the Society of Arts in John-street, Adelphi, having ridden all the way from their own doors in a private carriage. Shortly after they had entered the society's rooms, they noticed a tall man of a shabby genteel appearance, with an umbrella in his hand, who was studiously watching their movements, and every now and then placed himself in their way and pushed past them, much to their annoyance. As they were on the point of leaving, he came close to them, and they distinctly felt his umbrella rubbed against them. On regaining their carriage, two of them found the skirts of their dresses bespattered with a most filthy and disgusting semi-fluid, as if propelled from a syringe, emitting a most noisome and sickening odour, and at the same time effectually staining and damaging the material. The ladies have not the slightest shadow of a doubt but that the umbrella carried by this man was the vehicle of the abominable filth. (6)
Physical activity levels and body weight in a nationally representative sample in the European Union
- Maria Daniel Vaz de Almeida, Pedro Graça, Cláudia Afonso, Amleto D'Amicis, Raimo Lappalainen, Soren Damkjaer
-
- Journal:
- Public Health Nutrition / Volume 2 / Issue 1a / January 1999
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 02 January 2007, pp. 105-114
-
- Article
-
- You have access Access
- Export citation
-
Objectives
The main objectives of this pan-European study were: (1) to identify different types of physical activity and the time devoted to them, (2) to assess physical activity/inactivity at work and in leisure time, and (3) to determine self-reported body weight and height.
Design and subjectsIn each member state of the EU, approximately 1000 adults, aged 15 years or more, were selected to participate in an interview-assisted face-to-face questionnaire on physical activity and body weight. In each country, sample selection was quota-controlled to ensure national representativeness. Overall, 15 239 subjects in the EU completed the study.
ResultsOn average in the EU, nearly three-quarters of the population participate in some kind of activity. In general, the highest proportions of participants were found in the Nordic countries and the lowest in the southern ones. At the European level, the five most common activities include walking, gardening, cycling, keep fit and swimming. Higher participation rates were found among men, younger subjects and those with a higher level of education. The majority of Europeans fall within the normal body mass index (BMI) range but more than one-third are overweight (31%) or obese (10%) and 11% have a BMI below 20.
ConclusionsSeveral risk groups related to physical activity emerge from this survey: women, those with a lower level of education, older subjects, the overweight/obese and the underweight. Programmes to promote physical activity need to be tailored to the different groups identified in each country/region in order to increase adherence of non-participants and for the maintenance of those already engaged in activities.
![](/core/cambridge-core/public/images/lazy-loader.gif)