The Guardian from London, Greater London, England • 7

GUARDIAN WOMEN Tuesday July 25 1978 7 -1 t. "is a' picture of a young empire." Steve Gooch comes from a working class South London background Perhaps that's why .1 can write sympathetically about women. Many working-class men have have' a better attitude to women than the middle class. Many even in my parents' day, had more generosity towards their women and accepted at least a kind of equality. Ann and Marv were Dart (I Hcbos aaQlfgft II ttaaaaotlKv.

jp 1 vLaoaoa wfi A play which opens tomorrow fells the strange tale of two lusty lasses who became pirates. Steve Gooch tells Judith Cook how he came to write it THEY'MADE a' strangle ''pair of pirates. Ami Boraney was the wild and beautiful, daughter of an Irishman, quite prepared to make love to a main if, she liked him, and to knock him senseless if she did not Read, looked, and fought, like a main, yet yearned for a life of domesticity. Togetherthey are the heroines, of Steve -Gooch's new plajv The Women-Pirates Ann Bomney and Mary Read, which- opsins at They joined the' pirates for different- 'Mary Read's mother had brought her up as a boy. She ran away joined the army, as a.

man, but then fell in love with a' fellow recruit, left the amy, and' happily settled down to married life. Her husband was murdered a few yeans later and wow destitute, donned male aittdie, became a seaman, was eventually captured by pirates, and joined them. Again she tried to break away and settle down. In spite of 'her yearnings for female respectability she was, by all accounts, a marvellous swordsman and on many occasions killed her man. Ann's father had emigrated to America.

She ran away Mb ho hf -land a-: Left Ann "Bonney, rigftt; Mary Read frorri the Mary. Evans 'Picture Library. Centre: Steve Gooch. pregnant. "It was.

good rough justice -that they escaped," says Gooch. Mary, in fact, escaped hanging only to die of fever in her cell, her dream of domesticity reanatoinig. unfulfilled. Ann, it is said, went back to her father's home in Charleston. According to one story she married and settled down, according to another she rode the high seas into old age.

"Ann is probably the one dollop of a lively alternative society I which had dropped out of the I terrible working conditions and sordid wars of Europe. Many contemporary records seem to point out that pirates really liked an easy life and did as little killing and fighting as possible many of them had done all too much of it in the army or navy of the day. They would run up a black flag and their prey would often surrender. "They -were looking for a new kind of lifo. and these two women were involved with them in that I've tried to show, eventually, the men and women trying to find that way together, difi1 cussing things with each other rather than making individual sexist statements to the audience." and devalued by everything from straight fashion plates to the welter of articles telling how to re-shape the nose.

The question of whether or not fashion and dressing-up is done specifically for men arose. Ann Marie felt that a lot of women do believe they must dress a certain way to please either their own men or men in general. If a woman dresses in sexy clothes, particularly, men will almost always draw a conclusion from the way she looks. So surely. I asked, one of the tenets of feminist philosophy must be to wear deliberately nonsexual clothes Michele does not think it's as simple as that.

"Women don't just dress for men, they dress for themselves and for other women. What clothes you wear depends on how much money you've got, what your position in life is, and how much time you've got to think about your appearance." All the women agreed that their clothes had to be both cheap and comfortable. Ann Marie added It is only recently that I have felt enough in control of my life to dress as I wish. I now feel I can be intelligent, able and interesting, regardless of what I wear, and it is liberating. Rnpanse Hip women I talked with, all felt that the'.

meuia s.nui nanuims ag, wish, but, all are in one. way or, interested jn'clothes. we asked them prepare their own feature on the subject. It wil appear in Guardian Women tomorrow. continuous basis there will be fewer emergencies.

Young mothers who have become familiar with our staff already handle their babies' normal problems more easily. "When we have enough nurses to do as much as SO per cent of the follow-up treatment, the blood test, cardiagrams, inoculations and doctors will not only be able to increase their caseload, but will have more- time to spend with, patients'on' the prevention of. sickness and injury," she Though tiny in the' vast, scheme- -of America's1 'high cost, low benefit medical services this clinic v- and several hundred others staffed by the National Health Service' Corps, seem to have Cound a potent prescription for humane and efficient health care. Counter spy Diana Pollock SMITHS'. -Industries Time lpoks like the time controller.

on a domestic boiler. it is a plug -rinto any three-point the; centre of the face, surrounded 'dwith usual dials, are three mope oblong holes like- any other socket outlet. Into these can be plugged such, things. as radiators, fan heaters, electric blankets, or coffee percolators. ajso 'connect radio and lights to act as a burglar, discourager.

The price is, i 12.9l., from electricity departments, (pf larger stores and specialist electrical equipment retailers. If hard to find ring Jane Atkinson on 01-839 6972 and ask for a retailer's name in your own area. THERE are two versions of the Polypika with holes for ventilation of fruit or without for holding water. Both have the advantages of their traditional basket shape, a good broad base and a couple of tough handles. Made of high-grade polyethylene in pale yellow the measurements are 12in 16in Sin high, handles hinge flat and there are two small lug handles at the ends.

By mail order only from Intrend Products, Church Road, Paddock Wood, Kent. The prices arc perforated 3.46, plain 3.24, add 1 for either version. THE BLADES of cylinder mowing machines get blunt with summer use so the Mowsharp an abrasive strip on a moulded plastic batten could save a lot of time and keep blades nicely in trim. There are three lengths 12in. (99p), 14in.

(1.15) and 18in. (1.59) which can be cut fit other sizes with a hacksaw. The plastic batten has a slot to slip over the fixed base blade. From hardware, DIY and garden centres, or Continenta Ltd, Teesdale Works, Cooks Road, London E15 will be able to give retailers' names if the Mow-sharp is not stocked near by. ALT i the traditional Spanish furniture at Artesania, 507 Kings Road, London SW10 (01-352 2468), is made by craftsmen, near Madrid.

Their selection of chests (ideal for storing rugs and garden cushions in a hall) are of alder or Chestnut- prices expensive at" 'around Alder chests like this one With panels, wtfought-tron drop-, ring, handles, and lock 88,,: but prices- around The chest ought to last a couple iof hundred years at least. Measurements of this chest are 100 40 45 cm reference number VI 415. Delivery can be arranged. THE NEWEST version of Tower Housewares Slo-Cooker has' a removable stoneware pot and an automatic control so is called the Auto Slo-Cooker. In most slow cookers it-'is necessary: to- turn the heat up to full to get.

things going and then 'turn the heat down for simmering. With this model a thermostat adjusts from high to low automatically which saves time. Capacity is six pints, price about 32.50, casing is fawn and pot warm darkish brown from branches of Debenhams. Replacement pots will cost about 8 from TI Tower Housewares, PO Box 16, Wolverhampton. LI a 6 ffipr ill1' a pickpocket, but it became the whole play.

I pirates featured Jargely ia.the,.,p.opular, fiction of 'the time -arid instead of writing a about outlaws I make them female lives touched many of the great events of their age, the European wars, troubles in Ireland, the young America, and the growth of the colonies and buccaneering. It should be able to look as they themselves want to look, wear clothes in which they feel happy and comfortable. But this should allow a woman to dress up as well as dress down, if that is how she feels at any particular time." Elizabeth said I think for young girls it is very confusing and difficult. In the teens and early twenties one is fumbling for recognition and status in many different ways and olothes are an easy way of gaining an identity. So girls buy magazines, see what the latest Honey or 19 shows as the way to look good, and feel they must follow that.

In turn that means that they will be seen as someone projecting a fashion look, but not as an individual person." Like many other women, the feminists complained that models are always slim, almost always willowy, and with beautiful posture. Most people are physically very; different from, this, ordinary female. is, by implication, rejected ity-' sponsors -were' forthcoming, btit several' from' the initial application to the opening of the critically; needed facility, the! -project came to a grinding halt because of bureaucratic foot-dragging. Anything to dp with chartge in the American medical establishment, even moving one bed in a hospital, must go before a review board. (- we now have three If.

they -can't handle the volume we', expect, more nurses to help them," Edith Mas. said. OUT patients' have much higher rates of anemia, diabetes, high Wood pressure and other-debilitating diseases. In the first: year; we'-anticipate about eight visits per (the national' average is four) but as their illnesses, are. treated, on a realised that if they.

did not hang together they-would, literally, harag'seRar-; ately I had wanted to write a play about the law and those outside it, a kind of cops and robbers story, but as time went on I became more interested in those outside the law, especially the women. Female Transport started off as a sketch for- the first idea, just one episode involving Charlotte Bradley, 2 the feminists hate able that they feel angry at the idea that fashion is an important part of a woman's role and that without it she is undervalued." Annette felt that feminist anger is related to woman's role in history. She has always been expected to dress in a certain way and if she dared to break the rules, there would be trouble." Fashion pages, she said, perpetuate the idea that women should choose clothes in order to convince the world that they are efficient, feminine, sexy, intellectual, whereas men can demonstrate all those things without necessarily dressing the part. Ursula added: "The people who deliberately reject fashion often have a very valid reason for feeling angry at the way society has pressurised and exploited them. They have had bad experiences and if they are kicking back through clothes they have every right to do it.

"Women have so often felt pressured into looking as others want them to look. Feminists feel that people bvstreiCh and information about family planning are what they need." East Harlem residents to manage their ownealth service is part of-the. job of its director, Edith-, Mas. She has worked in the area for 13 years as a public health nurse and has been the; driving force behind the new clinic since the Corps urban programme was announced. Before any community can make a request tor Corps staff, it must "produce local, sponsors to provideian office, medical equipment, supplies and administrative support.

But even when money is raised to set a programme motion there is still no guarantee that a doctor will be assigned because thn demand is so great In East Harlem, commun today's women would more easily identify with," says Gooch. "She made more positive choices and she was a born survivor." Women-Pirates was the result of his research for an earlier play, Female Transport. That followed the fortunes of a group of women convicts on their way to Australia and how, in spite of their many differences, they came together. They The fashion photos haircuts) to those of Elizabeth who is "potty" about clothes, and spends money on glossy fashion magazines. They broadly agreed that clothes can he enjoyable and that fashion pages, promoting them, are not by definition bad, but there was plenty criticism of the way fashion is promoted through the media and unanimous feeling that none of the newspaper or magazine fashion pages handle the subject suitably.

The fashion press, they all felt, promotes the idea that a woman must dress a certain way to toe acceptable and valued. Ann Marie We are given a stereotype of the way a woman must look and the articles imply that it is only by bothering about your clothes, by wearing whatever the look that is toeing publicised that day, a woman can be proud of herself. There are a lot of women around who lead very busy, demanding lives, often looking after children and a home, where there just is not money or time and energy to devote to the business of dressing up. It is understand tion in 1966 of Medicare and Medicaid the health of Americans living below the poverty level in many inner cities has deteriorated over the last decide. The National Health Service Corps was' started seven years' ago to provide medical services for tiny rural communities which could not support their own medical staff.

The three pioneers in East Harlem are well aware that alone they cannot cope with the health problems of a crowded urban practice. One of them, Sophie Balk, a 28-year-old paediatrician with two children of her own, says: "We can screen for tuberculosis and treat lead poisoning, but then our patients go right back to the same housing conditions which caused the diseases. Jobs, better housing and diet. with a no-good who became a pirate and embraced the life wholeheartedly: "Ann was madly attractive; She used her sexuality to get just what she wanted," said Steve Gooch. At the end of the play his bunch of pirates are caught and sentenced to be hanged.

Mary (played by Charlotte Cornwell) and Ann (Diane Quick) escape by pleading their bellies they were both CLOTHES are a taboo subject for some feminists. Talking about what you wear throws up a lot of complex feelings. To some it implies that vou are preoccupied with the image you present to the world. But clothes are also a wav of expressing Ursula Owen, co-director of the feminist publishing company Virago was one of a group of feminists I collected together to talk about their feelings about fashion. The idea was sparked off by the letters I have received during my time as fashion editor for the Guardian, from members of the women's movement.

All have been critical, ranging in tone from the vitriolic to the coolly reasoning. Criticisms have focused on all aspects of the fashion page the subject of the feature, the way it is photographed, the model used, the words, arid there have been women who feel that pages, per se, should be abolished. I disagree with much they have to say, but I acknowledge their sincerity besides, the questions they raise are difficult and important ones. Everybody wears clothes and therefore everyone must, to some extent, select garments and make a calculated decision about the they want to be seen. So what does condition that choice for-women who reject the sexist priority of conventional -fashion promotion There are women who choose the least attractive, the "Ost uniform, the least symbolic clothes "they can find.

There are those who deliberately A health NEW YORK has no shortage, On the the'" ratio of doctors' to patients; is twice the US national average about three for every thousand inhabitants'. -Yet certain areas of New York City are so dangerously lacking in health care cover that the Federal Government has been forced to send volunteer teams of young doctors into its commercial capital city under a programme originally designed for isolated rural areas. Rv thp mil nf his vear 20 to 30 National Health Service Corps doctors win oe wonting in the metropolitan, area of New York. The first three volunteers have, been in group practice in a former social club in East Harlem since December 1977. All three are New Yorkers, Cflottflnes esneoTUumttei? After criticism oS the fashion pages from feminists, Angela Neustatter invited six women to have their say.

The press promotes the idea that a woman must dress a certain way to be acceptable and valued, they all believed-and didn't like it Penny Allen reports on a challenge to the male technocrats Female energy YOUNG GIRLS spend a lot of time drawing, writing, making, magazines and newspapers. They form secret societies, design badges, and labour over coded documents to be signed in blood. Later they find that men are in control of all the main means of public expression. In acknowledgment of this some papers run women's pages, but there are very few places where serious women's voices can be heard giving views on anything but the home. Even the alternative voices are male-dominated as the women who have formed part of the collective on the Alternative Technology magazine', Undercurrents, have found.

This month, in spite of churlishness from some of the men, they have brought out a women's issue whose subject matter is energy and technology and woman's place in it. For feminists there is some contradiction in aligning themselves with alternative groups. Women have so long been denied an active part in the mainstream of political and economic power that the feminist struggle is usually centred round the fight for women's work to be recognised as valuable and the struggle to enter male preserves. To opt out of a system we have scarcely been permitted to enter smacks of defeatism. But the contributors are well aware of the contradiction.

The heroine of Jo Nesbitt's double page cartoon is whisked away from husband, three blooming kids," and kitchen sink to communal living in a squat off the Edgware Road where every dish washed is a nail in the coffin of capitalism." The last frame shows her washing up for five blooming men and fourteen blooming kids muttering What we need is some alternative Alternatives." As feminists the contributors are well-versed In the language and thought of the women's movement, but are eager to go beyond consciousness raising and introspection. OK, we're women. OK, we've been oppressed. But let's not reiterate that. What creative statement do we want to make writes Melanie Thompson describing the thought behind her partnership in the dance theatre entertainment on nuclear power, New Clear Energy.

"We decided to examine a larger subject than our oppression as women, a subject with more universal reach, that actually affects the very planet we live on." While some articles question the nature of femininity, exploring traditional notions of female intuition, and creativity and the ways they are at odds with male-pro-1 duced technology, others focus on specific issues like Windscale, the trade unions or contraception. One of the main probr lems," says Lyn Simonon, the editor and co-ordinator, "was lack of confidence in writing. Women had to be constantly encouraged and reassured. In the end, we got twice as manv pieces as we had room for." As it is, the magazine is narked with writing and drawing that is so relaxed, original, and humorous that vou piipht'think the contributors had all bepn making magazines since Undercurrents can be obtained from 27 Clerkenwell Close, London EC1R OAT, price 45p. attempt not to look appealing through what wear.

But there are also plenty of committed feminists who clearly take a lot of care with what they wear, and have a real interest in the changing moods of fashion. The idea of arranging a forum of feminists was to get a range of ideas and thoughts. There were no preconceptions or advance plans for this article. I got together a group of feminists, through one or two women I knew, but I couldn't trace any of the women who had written really angry letters (and hope that they will now write again). In the end there were six women (Ann Marie Wolpe, Annette Kuhn, Elizabeth Wilson, Julia Naish, Michele Barrett, Ursula Owen.

All go-out to work, two of them have children, two of them are gay, and three of them are married. Their ages range from 46 to 28. Their feelings about fashion varied between those of Michele, who said she was. not particularly interested in clothes (tout cares more about' service for Harlem white, middle-class and their salaries are 32,000 dollars a -year, about half what they would be earning in private practice at this stage of their careers. East Harlem a mixed ethnic area whose landscape resembles London's East End after the blitz.

Recent research has produced worry- i ing information about its high rates of chronic illness and infant mortality among the poor sections of the community, mainly blacks and Puerto Ricans. While private medical practioners duster in the salfe, affluent parts of town, East Harlem's hospitals grow more crowded and their staff increasingly overworked. For despite America's escalating medical bill (nearly billion dollars this year) and the introduc-.