At the time of "The Jewel of Seven Stars" writing, the empowerment and assertiveness of women was on the rise. The "fin de siècle" was marked by the emergence of the "New Woman", middle-class feminists who espoused the domestic sphere and sought social and sexual freedom, challenging the gender roles that dominated British society. Jusova explains that by " and defamiliarizing the hegemonic Victorian definitions of gender and sexual identities, the New Woman further fueled the anxieties and fears that already circulated among the middle-class British population at the time".