2000
First Published
3.66
Average Rating
332
Number of Pages
Margaret Cavendish was one of the most subversive and entertaining writers of the seventeenth century. She invented new genres, challenged gender roles, and critiqued the new science as well as the mores of society. "Paper Bodies" was the wonderful phrase she used to described her manuscripts, which she hoped would continue to make "a great Blazing Light" after her death. There are connections here to Cavendish's most famous work, The Description of a New World, Called the Blazing World (1666), a unique tale of a woman travelling through the north pole to a strange new world. In addition to The Blazing World, this volume includes Cavendish's brief autobiography, A True Relation of My Birth, Breeding and Life (1667), her play The Convent of Pleasure, and selections from her Sociable Letters, her poetry, and her critical writings. A variety of background documents by other seventeenth-century writers helps to set her work in context for the modern reader.
Avg Rating
3.66
Number of Ratings
117
5 STARS
20%
4 STARS
37%
3 STARS
35%
2 STARS
7%
1 STARS
2%
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Author
Margaret Cavendish
Author · 13 books
Margaret Lucas Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle, was the youngest child of a wealthy Essex family. At the age of 20 she became Maid of Honour to Queen Henrietta Maria and traveled with her into Persian exile in 1644. There she married William Cavendish, Marquis (later Duke) of Newcastle. Between 1653 and 1668 she published many books on a wide variety of subjects, including many stories that are now regarded as some of the earliest examples of science fiction.
