Description
Based on the letters, diaries, and account books of over one hundred women from commercial, professional, and gentry families, this book transforms our understanding of the position of women in Georgian England. In their own words, they tell of their sometimes humorous, sometimes moving experiences and desires, and of their many roles, including kinswoman, wife, mother, housekeeper, consumer, hostess, and member of polite society. By the nineteenth century, family duties continued to dominate women's lives, yet, Vickery contends, the public profile of privileged women had reached unprecedented heights.
About the Author
Amanda Vickery is lecturer in modern British women's history at Royal Hollowly College, University of London.
Reviews
"The most important thing in English feminist history in the last ten years." Roy Porter; "The Gentleman's Daughter is the most important work of social history since Lawrence Stone's Family, Sex and Marriage. From now on, any historian writing about 18th-century women will have to address the arguments in Vickery's book... It is the first book to bring out into the open the debate about separate spheres. It succeeds on two levels, first as an academic argument of the highest order, and second as a fascinating and enjoyable read. Serious history is rarely this fun." Amanda Foreman, The Times; "Innovative, expertly researched and luminous in style." Linda Colley, London Review of Books; "Amanda Vickery's new history of women in Georgian England offers a revolutionary reinterpretation of the accepted script, both an academic triumph and a spell-binding read" Julie Wheelwright, The Independent
Book Information
ISBN 9780300102222
Author Amanda Vickery
Format Paperback
Page Count 448
Imprint Yale University Press
Publisher Yale University Press
Weight(grams) 318g