Writing a book set in 1929. How obsessively did people conform to modesty rules? The reason I ask is I'm about 12 chapters in, and one of the main protagonists (female) has let her male friend into her bathroom via the window while she's having a bath. They're known each other for some time, they're both 17 and the girl's parents have effectively grounded her, hence her having to see this boy covertly. She's in a towel when she opens the window but later sheds the towel and gets in the bath. Would this realistically happen that a girl in the 1920s would be this immodest? She's quite outgoing, but I guess I've always seen people of the past as prudes. Book is set in England, and the characters are both middle-class :)
Hiya, could you specify which country this book is set in, and something about the characters' social class? That would help focus responses. Thanks!
It would not be very likely. I wouldn't call it "obsessively conforming to modesty rules," which implies a certain level of conscious decision to have a nudity taboo, and also implies that being naked in front of a person of the opposite sex is not taboo today - but the standards for what was "revealing" in the 1920s and 1930s were more restrictive than today. As much as we look back on it as a liberated time with regard to women's bodies, hemlines never went above the knee and even most evening dress had fairly high necklines.