Daniel Mallory Ortberg

I think female solitude is a mental condition as well as a physical state. You can be married and a spinster. I think spinster is an identity every woman can claim, if she will... I feel like a lot of women, or a lot of feminists, joke about taking to the sea or living alone in a cottage as this kind of fun freedom.

American Writer

Jerome Charyn

Emily Dickinson has haunted my life - her poems, her persona, all the tales about her solitude. Ever since I discovered her in the seventh grade, I've had a crush on that spinster in white, who had such a heroic and startling inner landscape of her own.

American Author

Sarah MacLean

There is perhaps no more rewarding romance heroine than she who is not expected to find love. The archetype comes in many disguises - the wallflower, the spinster, the governess, the single mom - but always with one sad claim: Love is not in her cards.

Jo Beverley

When a gently born spinster has little money, her choices are few. She might receive an offer of marriage, but it's unlikely to be from a wealthy man, so she'll have a hard life trying to make ends meet for her growing family.

British Writer

Laurie Graham

Not so very long ago, certainly well into the Thirties, a lady companion was a normal feature of life for widows or lone spinsters.

English Journalist

Juliana Hatfield

At heart I am a librarian, a bird-watcher, a transcendentalist, a gardener, a spinster, a monk.

American Musician

Patricia Routledge

People have always pitied spinsters. We have been derided, as if we had missed out on life.

English Actress

Daphne Guinness

I know sometimes I can come off like a lonely spinster in a tower. That's not me at all.

British Artist

Gemma Arterton

I always thought I was going to end up an old spinster, with my cats and fur coats.

Ann Widdecombe

I am toothy, dumpy, ugly, overweight, a spinster - what the hell?

British Politician

The term 'spinster' can sound old-fashioned and possibly offensive to modern ears.

Outdated Term

'Spinster' may imply a woman is lonely or missed out on marriage, which might not be true.

Negative Connotations

Be cautious not to stereotype or assume personality traits based on someone's marital status.

Avoid Stereotyping

Originally indicated a woman's job, not her marital status. It can be a useful historical word.

Historical Occupation

Remember 'spinster' has a non-marital meaning related to spinning thread, in historical contexts.

Non-Marital Meaning

The legal term 'spinster' is still used in formal documents, meaning an unmarried woman.

Formal Documents

The legal usage of 'spinster' is uncommon in everyday conversation, and generally reserved for legal forms.

Not Common Speech

 father's death by the time of the Civil War Lizzie was in her mid forties a small dowdy spinster with dotting blue eyes in seemingly nervous disposition she was a staunch unionist who refused to cooperate in any way with the

James Robertson: The...

 The starving orphan seeking a second helping of gruel. The spinster wasting away in her tattered wedding dress.