Spinster World War prevented many within a generation of women from experiencing romance and marriage, or having children. The image of the old spinster with a fading photo of her dead World War I soldier boyfriend on her fireplace mantel was common in films of the 1950s and 1960s. Likewise, in the American classic novel "Gone with the Wind" (1936) about the Civil War, numerous references are made to grieving fiancées, women who were "wanted, if not wed", and to the shortage of single, able-bodied (and thus "marriageable") men at war's end. In modern peacetime societies with wide opportunities for romance,
The Spinster and Her Enemies outspoken, noting that she was open about the involvement of Victorian feminism in "moralistic propaganda", admired people who were "admittedly reactionary", and rejected sexual liberation. Jeffreys commented in the second edition of "Anticlimax" (2011) that she wrote "The Spinster and Her Enemies" to "demonstrate that the 'sexual revolutions' of the 20th century liberated men by legitimising increased sexual access to women, rather than leading to women's empowerment." The Spinster and Her Enemies The Spinster and Her Enemies: Feminism and Sexuality 1880–1930 is a 1985 book by the political scientist Sheila Jeffreys, in which the author discusses the change in sexual