Description: The Bluestockings by Susannah Gibson A New York Times Book Review Editors Choice An illuminating group portrait of the eighteenth-century women who dared to imagine an active life for themselves in both mind and spirit. FORMAT Hardcover LANGUAGE English CONDITION Brand New Publisher Description In England in the 1700s, a woman who was an intellectual, spoke out, or wrote professionally was considered unnatural. After all, as the wisdom of the era dictated, a clever woman—if there were such a thing—would never make a good wife. But a circle of women called the Bluestockings did something extraordinary: coming together in glittering salons to discuss and debate as intellectual equals with men, they fought for women to be educated and to have a public role in society. In this intimate and revelatory history, Susannah Gibson delves into the lives of these pioneering women. Elizabeth Montagu established one of the most famous salons of the Bluestocking movement, with everyone from royalty to revolutionaries clamoring for an invitation to attend. Her younger sister, Sarah Scott, imagined a female-run society and created a womens commune. Meanwhile, Hester Thrale, who also had a salon, saved her husbands brewery from bankruptcy and, after being widowed, married a man she loved—Italian, Catholic, and not of her social class. Other women made a name for themselves through their publications, including Catharine Macaulay, author of an eight-volume history of England, and Frances Burney, author of the audacious novel Evelina. In elegant prose, Gibson reveals the close and complicated relationships between these women, how they supported and admired each other, and how they sometimes judged and exploited one another. Some rebelled quietly, while others defied propriety with adventurous and scandalous lives. With moving stories and keen insight, The Bluestockings uncovers how a group of remarkable women slowly built up an eviscerating critique of their male-dominated world that society was not yet ready to hear. Author Biography Susannah Gibson is an Irish writer and historian. She is the author of The Spirit of Inquiry and Animal, Vegetable, Mineral? She holds a PhD from the University of Cambridge in eighteenth-century history and lives in Cambridge, England. Review "Fast-paced and intimate…Gibson conjures palpably the all too ephemeral achievement of the Bluestockings: their sparkling conversation, wafting out through high windows, to be borne down the centuries by the London breeze." -- Francesca Wade - New York Times Book Review"A vivid and absorbing series of interwoven biographies of some of the eras most fascinating and accomplished females…Among the many pleasures of The Bluestockings is the reminder that history doesnt consist of the churning of vast impersonal forces but has at its heart the personalities and ambitions of singular men and women." -- Meghan Cox Gurdon - Wall Street Journal"As the Irish writer and historian Susannah Gibson shows in her intelligent and engrossing new book, The Bluestockings, their insistence on womens rationality as the basis for equal treatment could make the Bluestockings quite punitive toward any among them who strayed from the straight and narrow…But lets give them the credit theyre due, as Gibson does, persuasively and without special pleading." -- Margaret Talbot - The New Yorker"A revelation…Susannah Gibson tells a group history about these fascinating women, people who launched intellectual salons, founded communes, ran their husbands business better than he could and so on, all while facing the opprobrium of society." -- Michael Glitz - Parade"Scholarly but accessible, vividly rendered, and a font of inspiration for the modern woman thinker." -- The Millions"Spirited, lively, and scholarly….A close-up view of some notable bluestockings leaves the reader gasping at their energy." -- Miranda Seymour - Literary Review"The authors engaging account honors the determination and charm with which her subjects seized as much freedom as society would allow them. Vivid popular history illuminating some neglected feminist pioneers." -- Kirkus Reviews"It is a delight to read this vividly fresh celebration of mid-eighteenth-century scholars, intellectuals, and conversationalists, who dared to deviate from gender norms, a new breed of womanhood preceding Mary Wollstonecrafts claim for a new genus. Susannah Gibson, an eloquent storyteller, offers a novel approach to group biography with a series of telling chapters on salons, friendship, motherhood, and love." -- Lyndall Gordon, author of The Hyacinth Girl"Brilliant, earnest, quietly unconventional, the Bluestockings are the unsung pioneers of early British feminism. Their networks empowered women while their salons, stressing conversation and civility, opposed the misogynous, boozy male culture of the eighteenth century. Blending story, history, and delicious anecdote, Susannah Gibsons book opens a sparkling window onto this extraordinary society of engaged, energetic, and very witty women." -- Janet Todd, author of Jane Austen and Shelley in the Garden"Susannah Gibsons important, fluidly written book brings vividly to life the salons and communes, friendships and mentorships and rivalries of some of the most important figures of the English Enlightenment. It is an alien world, in some ways: of women who invite writers to move in with their families, and who throw parties every night for the leading painters and writers and politicians of their time. But it is also a magnetically attractive world, and one that shapes our own. I am so grateful for this book." -- Benjamin J. B. Lipscomb, author of The Women Are Up to Something Details ISBN0393881385 Author Susannah Gibson Year 2024 ISBN-13 9780393881387 Format Hardcover Publication Date 2024-07-23 Subtitle A History of the First Womens Movement Country of Publication United States Audience General US Release Date 2024-07-23 Publisher WW Norton & Co Imprint WW Norton & Co Place of Publication New York Language English ISBN-10 0393881385 Illustrations 40 illustrations; 8 page black-and-white insert Pages 352 DEWEY 305.420941 UK Release Date 1900-01-01 We've got this At The Nile, if you're looking for it, we've got it. With fast shipping, low prices, friendly service and well over a million items - you're bound to find what you want, at a price you'll love! TheNile_Item_ID:160715434;
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Format: Hardcover
Language: English
ISBN-13: 9780393881387
Author: Susannah Gibson
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Book Title: The Bluestockings
