One of the New York Times' 100 Notable Books of 2024

A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice

One of The New Yorker's Best Books of 2024

An illuminating group portrait of the eighteenth-century women who dared to imagine an active life for themselves in both mind and spirit.

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 women's commune. Meanwhile, Hester Thrale, who also had a salon, saved her husband's 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.

• We started tracking this book on July 7, 2024.
• This book was $14.99 when we started tracking it.
• The price of this book has changed 3 times in the past 385 days.
• The current price of this book is $9.99 last checked one hour ago.
• This book is at its lowest price in the past 90 days.
• This lowest price this book has been offered at in the past year is $9.66.
• The lowest price to date was $9.66 last reached on August 16, 2024.
• This book has been $9.66 one time since we started tracking it.
• The highest price to date was $14.99 last reached on September 28, 2024.
• This book has been $14.99 2 times since we started tracking it.

• HistoryEuropeWesternGreat BritainGeorgian Era (1714-1837)
• HistoryEuropeWesternUnited KingdomGeorgian Era (1714-1837)
• HistorySocial & CulturalLGBTQ+ & Gender Studies

• Publication Date: July 23, 2024
• Text-to-Speech: Disabled
• Lending: Disabled
• Print Length: 342 Pages
• File Size: 161 KB