Jane Misme

Jane Misme
Jane Misme by Henri Manuel (1874–1947)
Born	1865
Died	1935
Nationality	French
Occupation	Journalist
Known for	Feminism

Jane Misme (1865–1935) was a French journalist and feminist. She founded the feminist journal La Française (The Frenchwoman), published from 1906 to 1934, and was a member of the executive of the French Union for Women's Suffrage and the National Council of French Women.

Jane Misme was born in 1865.

In January 1893 Jeanne Schmahl founded the Avant-Courrière (Forerunner) association, which called for the right of women to be witnesses in public and private acts, and for the right of married women to take the product of their labor and dispose of it freely. The campaign aimed to mobilize middle- and upper-class women who had moderate and conservative views. Anne de Rochechouart de Mortemart (1847–1933), Duchess of Uzès and Juliette Adam (1836–1936) soon joined the Avant-Courrière, and Schmahl found support from Jane Misme and Jeanne Chauvin (1862–1926), the first woman to become a doctor of law.

Jane Misme became a journalist when she was about thirty years old, writing from 1896 to 1906 in newspapers such as Le Figaro, Le Matin and the Revue de Paris. Her articles covered subjects such as the social roles of women in the past, and the new careers open to women. She was also drama critic for La Fronde and L'Action from 1899 to 1905.La Fronde had been founded by the actress and suffragist Marguerite Durand in 1897. In October 1901 Misme wrote in an article on "the conception of women in French theater" for La Fronde,

Of the many things disrupting contemporary society, perhaps the most important is the transformation in the lives of women. They, who have remained the same for centuries and centuries, across all civilizations, are now in the process of no longer being the same. While the traditional woman has not yet disappeared, she has been challenged by another, baptized the New Woman. The two are in conflict and the world is fighting over them.

La Fronde ceased publication in March 1905. Misme launched La Française (The Frenchwoman) the next year, to fill the gap. It was a four-page, large format weekly that first appeared on 21 October 1906. Cofounders included Mathilde Meliot, director if the Monde Financier, and Marguerite Durand.Germaine Dulac was a regular contributor, writing literary portraits between 1906 and 1908, and theatrical criticism from 1908 to 1913. The paper was owned by the writers through a cooperative. This parent organization, the Cercle de La Française, was described as a "home of practical and moral action for all feminine interests." Unlike La Fronde, Misme accepted men as collaborators, but refused to argue over politics or religion. The focus would be on "the situation and role of women in France and abroad." In 1908 Misme wrote that La Francaise was strongly against "violent public demonstrations" which were "essentially incompatible with French style [goût]".