WHAT WE WOMEN THINK

Radio Record, Volume V, Issue 15, 23 October 1931, Page 32

WHAT WE WOMEN THINK

Age Cannot Wither. NE does not have to stay long in the U.S.A. to realise how important a factor the middle-aged woman is in American affairs. Even when she has passed middle life, she is still a force in business, politics, and public service. In truth, there is no place in the world where a woman ages so happily. How does she manage it? Well, in the first place she refuses to grow old, She does not resent grey — or white hair, but she keeps her face, her body, and her mind as young as possible. -Beauty culture flourishes not only in big cities, but in small towns and villages. It is one of the great industries of the U.S.A. She hag her weekly treatments to keep lines away and muscles taut, and she diets and exercises to keep her figure within bounds. She pays much attention to fashion, and refuses to be dated by her clothes, her coiffure, or her views on life. That she has grown children and grandchildren does not cramp her style in any way. Indeed, she welcomes the fact that she has had all that experience, and is now free to Zo into business for herself; take a parttime post, or devote her attention to politics, clubs, or charity with an enthusiasm which is amazing. In a recently-published report of the earnings of American businesswomen one learned that it is women who have thirty or forty years of work behind them who are getting the largest salaries. Their average wage is nearly -£2000 a year. American businessmen apparently prefer to have older women as. ‘secretaries and heads of departments, and they can always depend on such women being as attractive as care of the person can make them, welldressed, and with the assured manner of experience and self-confidence, Pouts and Powder, DVICH is now being given in the beauty salons on the new method of applying lipstick and the new shape to be given to the lips, to suit pseudoVictorian frills and frippery. The small and narrow line of lipstick, suitable for brief skirts and hard, slick outlines, and for tiny off-the-forehead hats; has gone into temporary retirement, according to a South Molton Street specialist. Her clients are being shown how to make a full Cupid’s bow, almost a pout, with lipstick, in order to suit feathered hats. Made-up lips are powdered afterwards to give a dewy and fresh look. At the same time a much broader outline is given to the lower lip than before. Not For Everywoman, 'MHE centre-parting with two twisted * rings coiled at each side and lank straight tresses have become as smart as any shingle or cluster of curls. The 1850 movement seems specially created to let the simple and severe coiffure have its place once again... It is amazing that the most dramatic millinery upheavals should arrive at the close of the London season, bringing in their train a complete change in coiffure. Many of the turban modes have been found to look their best when tilted over slightly, with a sweep of the own- , er’s straight hair dragged to a small bun at the back. From Mrs, Pepys’ Diary. At my reading do come upon a substitute for whipped cream, said to —

be equally delicious, which should render it of great use to many at this Season of the year, and here I do pass it on with much pleasure in the doing. =

UT Ty The way of it to add a sliced banana to the white of an egg, and to beat until. stiff, the banana entirely disappearing meanwhile, and the substitute as like

LR re ES the real thing as may be, or so it is promised for it. University Education for Women. IT "A Little Learning," Miss Doreen Wallace propounds certain problems. Should women go to universities? What good is a university education to the average product of a country secondary school? Are artists necessarily bounders? Such are some of the questions raised in this ingenuous study of "a little learning." As a picture of certain aspects of Oxford life, -it is successful in the way that school books. are. successful which accurately refiect the mentality of a schoolboy author. It is also amusing, and some of the scenes round the heroine’s home in the Hastern Counties are really good. The trouble is that under-graduates-and, for that-matter, under-graduettes-have a way of raising deep questions, and answering them with "more enthusiasm than experience. It is an excellent habit in the

EE EEE NOE eh el Gl AOS ee t universities, but not so excellent in a’ novelist. Therefore, "A Little Learn- * ing" must be taken Simply at its face value-a faithful mirror of the attitude of one type at least of the modern undergraduette. The conflict between marriage and a career is genuine, and the heroine’s attitude of mind only too common. A creative career demands creative brains and no amount of university enthusiasm can replace them, It is the tragedy of the undergraduette that the opposite delusion is more fatal to her than to her male counterpart. Those Realists, QNE wonders sometimes whether delicacy and reserve in literature will come into fashion again with a new generation; a swing-back from the offensive and unnecessary calling a spade a spade in which many yaying writers indulge is overdue. After all, there have ever been spades or their equivalent, and there are physical and other facts which need no emphasis. Yet some of the cleverest and most interesting . books are marred by the author going out of the way to call a spade a Spade when there was no need to mention the implement at all. The phrases are flung in your face with an air of bravado as if the writer had said: "There, what do you think of that! Didn’t I make you sit up?" But perhaps the realists will themSelves grow bored, now that nothing is secret or veiled, and -we are past being shocked, only rather disgusted with , bad taste and coarseness. Perhaps it {~ will be voted dull to underline the obvious; perhaps some unpleasant facts will be left to the imagination which can ignore them: perhans the ¢hines

of the spirit as well as those of the flesh will be given more prominence. It Will be interesting ‘indeed to see what the next generation of writers can do, for we grow very tired of decadent heroes and heroines who live their own lives regardless of the old-fashioned rules of conduct and character buildIng. The other kind will have the charm of novelty. Exit the Bowler. HEN hats in "the very latest style" are unceremoniously bundled into "hargain hasements" of the larger stores it means that: a particular style is doomed probably by its first overpowering success. The bowler, or to give it its more imposing name the "Amazone," is a case in point. J* pill be seen no more when autum Winter fashions are definitely launched. The tricorn will survive, so will the Robin Hood, and these are infiniteIv more becoming. A mannfacturer of feminine bowlers found himself left with such a huge number on his hands that he offered a thousand or so toa wholesale house at a cut price of three shillings each. And these were copies of "models" which were retailed lately at three guineas, Enter the "Bustle." CCORDING to the fashion dictators the return to the "bustle" this season is as certain: as the departure of the "bowler." It sounds incredible, but only this year we were all saying that women would never. return to the long skirt. Happily, whatever else it does, fashion keeps moving, ‘and only the calendar separates the fashionable from the frowsy.