By "dating" I mean specifically the time between when the man and the woman met each other, to the point where they would see themselves "officially" as lovers. For lack of a specific word for that... I'm wondering where would people go and what would they do, or even what would they avoid doing if anything would be frowned up. Anything that might be related might also be useful. Also, did couples walk around in the streets during the evening, or even during the night?
You'll probably get better answers if you can be more precise about the time frame and the location, but also about the social class of the people involved. Also maybe ages and life-stages... the behaviour allowed for a working class widow would be quite different from a young lady of quality...
Hmm... I would say late 1800s, since there are trains already, and the MC is a doctor in his early 30s (not sure what social class that would be). The woman is a mysterious person... Supposedly of a respectable class, but she's quite mischievous and provoking. Probably promiscuous, but the MC doesn't think she is. I was thinking of england, on some city. I'm not sure about where because the story I'm writing is very short anyway, and I don't really need to be specific. EDIT: I was under the impression that men (and maybe women too) used different kinds of hats depending on their social class? Is this the case? If so, what kind would a doctor use?
Social class is pretty important in that time period (late 1800s equals Middle to late Victorian Times) as money, education etc all play a part in social circles who you're going to mix with, the sort of activities you take part in and therefore Who would most likely meet and, in the end, Partner up with. Those in the upper classes would not have been able to walk around at night time (women would not have been allowed without a chaperone, Although during the daytime they might have gotten away with it), but the lower classes were a lot freer to do as they liked. There would have been horseriding, strolls in the park, tearooms, theatre– Ballet/plays/Opera, balls and dances. Lower class activities I'm not so sure on. Try www.Victoriana.com For clothing Info. Again a doctor words suggest middle-class, probably wealthy but not necessarily. Depends on his family's background also. Hope some of this helps!
I just found this site: http://ncsmodules.unl.edu/loveandseduction/introduction.php I don't know where I got the link from. Could be, someone here in the forum posted it. ^ ^ Anyway, it could be just the thing you're looking for. Edit: The links on the site that should lead to specific source texts do not work anymore. I have written an e-mail to the editors. It's really sad. Although there are a few information snippets in the several introduction texts, the source texts would be really helpful. If there is a way to get this site online again, it could be a great resource.
Edit II: Not all links don't work, so I found the solution. They have mistakes in many of their links. If you manually correct the mistakes, you can access the texts. Works: http://ncsmodules.unl.edu/loveandseduction/content.php?id=ls.00031 Does not: http://ncsmodules.unl.edu/ncs_loveandseduction/content.php?id=ls.00081 Delete the "ncs_" in the URLs of the non-working links and you'll be fine.
