Jane Austen £10 note: The other women we'd like to see on British banknotes
When the Bank of England agreed to put Jane Austen’s picture on a £10 note, following a spirited campaign by the feminist activist Caroline Criado-Perez, it marked a major step forward. Yet Austen is, from today, the only woman to appear on our banknotes apart from the Queen, which feels just a little anachronistic in the year 2017.
Aren’t there any other British women worthy of celebration in this way? The answer, of course, is yes. Beatrix Potter and Barbara Hepworth were both mooted as the new face of the £20 note, but in the event lost out to JMW Turner.
Here are some other British women we feel should make the cut some time soon:
1. Emmeline Pankhurst
She fought for women’s right to vote. Can there be a more democratic choice than Emmeline Pankhurst, the leader of the British suffragette movement, who frequently sacrificed her freedom and even put her life on the line for the cause? Every woman in the country owes her one, as does any man who believes in equality between the sexes. She deserves to be up there with the Churchills and Darwins of this world.
2. Virginia Woolf
If we’re going to honour towering figures of English literature, it only seems fair that the Godmother of modernist fiction gets a look-in. A central figure in the Bloomsbury Group, which remains an object of profound fascination today, Virginia Woolf has been hailed by readers, critics, feminists - and every combination of the three - for her work. She also had a lesbian affair with the novelist and poet Vita Sackville-West. Is it too much to suggest that putting Woolf on a banknote would strike a blow not only for women, but also against prejudice?
3. Mary Seacole
A heroine of the Crimean War, Mary Seacole’s reputation rivals that of Florence Nightingale for her contribution to nursing. She has been voted the greatest black Briton and a statue of her in central London, unveiled last year, was the first public statue in the UK of a named black woman. But just because she’s got a statue now doesn’t mean we can forget about her. Wouldn’t it be inspiring to see a black person (of either sex) on a banknote? Other countries have done it. Come on, Britain: keep up.
4. Agatha Christie
The best-selling novelist of all time, Agatha Christie contributed 66 detective novels to the crime fiction canon. That’s a hell of a lot of hours of reading she’s engrossed us in, and that’s before you get on to her 14 short story collections. But it’s not just about being prolific: Christie’s status in the collective memory is something akin to national treasure. The fact that her work is devoured and adored around the world, too, only makes her case all the more pressing.
5. Victoria Wood
Why can’t we have someone funny on a banknote? Yes, Churchill might have had a few good one-liners, but raising a chuckle was hardly his prime purpose in life. Victoria Wood made us laugh uproariously, her comedy rooted in the everyday and thus universally accessible. If there is one thing we pride ourselves on in this country it is our sense of humour. If this is a trait we want to celebrate (and we should), then what better woman to represent our funny side than Wood?
