Before Victoria: Extraordinary Women of the British Romantic Era

About this book

While a great deal has been written about romanticism's revolutionary ideology and aesthetics, another, less well known change was also occurring in British life; the transformation of women's lives and feminine manners. This book will surprise many readers as it chronicles the often-unheralded achievements of women who do not fit the standard notions of romanticism. What was this revolution like? Genteel women no longer laughed aloud at bawdy jokes and noble-women ran charity bazaars instead of private casinos. By 1800, motherhood had become a sacred calling and many women nursed their own children instead of sending them to wet nurses. This idealization of domesticity kept some women off the streets but afforded others new opportunities. Working from home, women published novels and poetry, sculpted busts, painted portraits, and conducted scientific research. Forgotten female astronomers, photographers, and mathematicians share these pages with celebrated writers such as Mary Shelley and her mother, Mary Wollstonecraft. This book also makes full use of The New York Public Library's extensive collections, including graphic works of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, manuscripts, hand-colored illustrations, broadsides, drawings, oil paintings, note-books, albums, and early photographs.

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