This is a study of Victorian feminism which focuses on four leading feminists: Emily Davies, Frances Power Cobbe,Josephine Butler, and Millicent Garrett Fawcett. This approach enables Barbara Caine to uncover the range, diversity, and complexity of Victorian feminism, and to examine the relationship between personal experience and feminist commitment. Professor Caine sets her carefully researched biographical studies of the four women, each with her own fascinating history, in the context of the Victorian feminist movement. She explores the ideas and strategies of feminists in the late nineteenth century, analysing the tensions which arose as they sought to achieve their aims. In particular, she traces the complex relationship between party politics and feminist commitment. Barbara Caine's insight into the vision and beliefs of these Victorian feminists is balanced by her scholarly understanding of the society within which they worked. She gives us vivid and perceptive portraits of four very different individuals, who nevertheless shared a commitment to improving the lot of women.

About the Author
Barbara Caine is the author of Destined to be Wives: The Sisters of Beatrice Webb (OUP 1986, OPB 1988): `the best and most unbiased kind of women's history ... stylishly written and imaginative study.' Times Literary Supplement

Reviews
raises some interesting issues ... Barbara Caine is a fine historian. * Claire Tomalin, The Times *
scholarly study of four Victorian feminists * Hermione Lee, Independent on Sunday *
perceptive and well-written studies * Times Literary Supplement *



Book Information
ISBN 9780198204336
Author Barbara Caine
Format Paperback
Page Count 298
Imprint Clarendon Press
Publisher Oxford University Press
Dimensions(mm) 216mm * 156mm * 18mm