A Radical in Retirement: Clara Collet, 1920–19481.

The subject of this article is a neglected period in the life of the prominent feminist social investigator, Clara Collet (1860–1948). The article establishes a narrative account of Collet’s life in retirement from primary and secondary sources, which then provides a context for an evaluation of the most notable political ideas found in her later texts. Some Colletian writings from before 1920 are also discussed, partly because previous Collet scholarship has neglected her connections with the Women’s Freedom League and the feminist wing of the Labour movement during her middle-age years. Like many progressives of her vintage, Collet’s political opinions were an amalgam of liberal and socialist ideas, and the article also makes connections between her views and wider debates within intellectual history, for example, the ‘New Liberalism’ and ‘new feminism’ debates. The article concludes that Collet’s political opinions during her old age were in many ways more radical than those she had expressed during the earlier stages of her lengthy career. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]