Library Information - Reading: The Winslow Boy

In 1897, various local women's suffrage societies formed the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies, under the leadership of Millicent Fawcett. The NUWSS wanted the vote for middle class property-owning women. They believed they would achieve their end using peaceful tactics - non-violent demonstrations, petitions and the lobbying of MPs. Fawcett believed that if the organisation was seen to be intelligent, polite and law-abiding then women would prove themselves responsible enough to participate fully in politics.

In 1918 the Representation of the People Act granted some women the right to vote in parliamentary elections, and the Equal Franchise Act of 1928 gave men and women equal voting rights for the first time. Explore short articles and examine scrapbooks, political pamphlets, photographs and posters to discover how suffragists and suffragettes campaigned for this democratic right.

Although the Archer-Shee case that the play is based on occurred during 1908–1911, Rattigan, in dramatising the story, moved the setting closer to the start of the First World War in order to backdrop the domestic action with the tension of what was happening in the wider world. This was particularly poignant for the audience when it was first performed, as World War II had only just ended and many present would still remember, and indeed have fought, in World War I; ‘the war to end war’.
Old Vic: The Winslow Boy Learning Resource

Terence Mervyn Rattigan (1911–1977) was born in London, the son of (William) Frank and Vera Rattigan. He was educated at Harrow, one of the most prestigious public schools in the country, but was not as wealthy as most of his privileged classmates. His father lost his job as a diplomat in 1922 and from that moment on the family struggled financially. Their relative lack of wealth fostered Rattigan’s sense of himself as an outsider, though he was careful to keep up appearances of maintaining a typical upper-middle-class lifestyle.