"Trembling like a reed, she lifted up her hoarse, sweet voice on the platform, but the reed was of steel and it was tremendous."
– Rebecca West, "A Reed of Steel"
Galvanizing Speeches
"The fiercest opposition would melt away before she had been five minutes on the platform. . . . It was all done by the expression of the face , and a voice that, like a stringed instrument in the hand of a great artist, put us in possession of every movement of her spirit |
Emmeline Pankhurst's Freedom or Death Speech
BBC News
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Votes for Women and The Suffragette
Pankhurst shrewdly captured the attention of a wide audience with the WSPU's publication of Votes for Women, and The Suffragette.
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Votes for Women, 1909, The Suffragettes in Pictures. |
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The Suffragette, C. 1910-1915, Museum of London. |
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The Suffragette, 1912, The Suffragettes in Pictures. |
“You have to make more noise than anybody else, you have to make yourself more obtrusive than anybody else, you have to fill all the papers more than anybody else”
– Emmeline Pankhurst, Freedom or Death
While Pankhurst's political theater garnered attention, it would take militancy to make national headlines.