Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle: A Glorious Fame

Goodreads helps you keep track of books you want to read. Want to Read saving…. Want to Read Currently Reading Read. Refresh and try again. Open Preview See a Problem? Thanks for telling us about the problem. Return to Book Page. Margaret Cavendish was the first woman writer to write specifically for publication and to consider herself primarily a writer.

• Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle: A Glorious Fame.
• Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle: A Glorious Fame by Kathleen Jones.
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She cloaked her shyness in extravagant dress and an exotic public persona. In the turbulent days of the Civil War and its aftermath, she wrote to express her hugely varied ideas. She believed in sexual equality, criticized the role of women in con Margaret Cavendish was the first woman writer to write specifically for publication and to consider herself primarily a writer.

She believed in sexual equality, criticized the role of women in contemporary society and even dared to criticize the institution of marriage. Hardcover , pages. Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle-upon-Tyne. To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up. To ask other readers questions about A Glorious Fame , please sign up.

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Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle-upon-Tyne - Wikipedia

This book is not yet featured on Listopia. This has recently been re-released on Kindle with new illustrations. Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle, was one of the very first women to write books for publication and was considered mad and immoral for allowing her work to appear in print. She had a very eventful life - living through the English civil war. Her family home was razed to the ground by Cromwell's troops, two of her brothers killed, and she escaped to France to join the court of Queen Henrietta in Paris, where she met her This has recently been re-released on Kindle with new illustrations.

Her family home was razed to the ground by Cromwell's troops, two of her brothers killed, and she escaped to France to join the court of Queen Henrietta in Paris, where she met her husband.

• 2 editions of this work.
• Drei Welten - drei Leben (German Edition).
• A Glorious Fame: The life of the Duchess of Newcastle by Kathleen Jones?
• Capricci del destino (Italian Edition)?
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She was only a gentleman's daughter, Newcastle was a friend of the king and one of the greatest landowners in England, so there was a lot of opposition to their marriage. It was a genuine love match and Newcastle a cavalier author himself encouraged his wife to write and paid for publication of her work.

A Glorious Fame was my first book. It grew out of a documentary I was writing for the BBC and someone suggested that it was so interesting it might make a biography. So I began writing it in my spare time, studying for a university degree during the day. It was very hard work, but I got a contract with Bloomsbury Publishing - which I was very pleased about - and I've been a full time author since then, though I've had to do a bit of creative writing tuition now and then to pay the bills.

Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle-upon-Tyne

Nov 11, Siria rated it liked it Shelves: A rather standard biography, but one which has a very interesting subject: Margaret, Duchess of Newcastle. She was one of the first English women to write for publication--memoirs, poetry, and even an early example of science-fiction--and to do so under her own name. She earned her a formidable reputation as an eccentric during her lifetime, though she is all but forgotten today.

Jones provides a decent introduction to the life of a remarkable woman. At an early age, Cavendish was already putting her ideas and thoughts down on paper since during this time period it was not common or accepted for women to be publicly intelligent. She kept her intellectual endeavours within the privacy of her home. When Queen Henrietta Maria was in Oxford, Cavendish successfully appealed to her mother for permission to become one of her Ladies-in-waiting. Cavendish accompanied the Queen upon her exile and moved to France. This took Cavendish away from her family for the first time.

She notes that while she was very confident in the company of her siblings, amongst strangers she became extremely bashful. Cavendish explains that she was afraid she might speak or act inappropriately without her siblings' guidance, which would go against her ambition to be well received and well liked.

She spoke only when absolutely necessary and, consequently, she came to be regarded as a fool. Cavendish excused her behaviour by stating that she preferred to be received as a fool rather than as wanton or rude. Regretting that she had left home to be a lady-in-waiting, Cavendish informed her mother she wanted to leave the court.

Her mother, however, persuaded Cavendish to stay rather than disgrace herself by leaving and provided her with funds that, as Cavendish notes, quite exceeded the normal means of a courtier. Cavendish remained a lady-in-waiting for two more years until she was married to William Cavendish who was, at the time, Marquis of Newcastle he was later made Duke. Cavendish noted that her husband liked her bashfulness.

She also stated that he was the only man she was ever in love with, loving him not for title, wealth or power, but for merit, justice, gratitude, duty, and fidelity. She believed these to be attributes that would hold people together, even through misfortune. She further credited such qualities as assisting her husband and her family to endure the suffering they experienced as a result of their political allegiance. In her dedication to her husband, Cavendish recounts a time when there were rumors surrounding the authorship of her works specifically that her husband wrote them.

Cavendish notes that her husband defended her amidst these accusations. But, she does admit to a creative relationship with her husband. Cavendish even gives him credit as her writing tutor. Her own writing "fashions an image of a husband and wife who rely on each other in the public realm of print. A few years after her marriage, Cavendish and her husband's brother, Sir Charles Cavendish , returned to England. Cavendish had heard that her husband's estate sequestrated due to his being a royalist delinquent was to be sold and that she, as his wife, could hope to benefit from the sale.

Cavendish, however, received no benefit. She pointedly noted that while many women petitioned for funds, she herself only petitioned once and, being denied, decided such efforts were not worth the trouble. After a year and a half she left England to be with her husband again. Cavendish asserted in A True Relation of My Birth, Breeding, and Life that her bashful nature, what she described as " melancholia ", made her "repent my going from home to see the World abroad.

In her memoir, Cavendish explained her enjoyment in reinventing herself through fashion. She said that she aimed for uniqueness in her dress, thoughts, and behavior, and that she disliked wearing the same fashions as other women. She also made her desire to achieve fame public. Several passages of her memoir remarked upon her virtuous character, and that while she acknowledged goodness in others, she thought it acceptable that she should hope to be better than them.

Cavendish said her ambition was to have everlasting fame. She also expected to be criticized for her decision to write a memoir. She responded by stating that she wrote the memoir for herself not for delight, but so that later generations would have a true account of her lineage and life. She said that she felt justified in writing her memoirs since it had been done by others, such as Caesar and Ovid. Poems and Fancies is a collection of poems, epistles , and some prose , written by Cavendish on a variety of themes. Her poems at times take the form of dialogues between such things as earth and darkness, an oak and a man cutting it down, melancholy and mirth, and peace and war.

As noted by Mistress Toppe see below , formerly Elizabeth Chaplain and Cavendish's maid, [17] Cavendish's writings took the form of poetical fiction, moral instruction, philosophical opinion, dialogue, discourses and poetical romances. Poems and Fancies also included The Animal Parliament , a prose piece consisting largely of speeches and letters.

The collection concludes with Cavendish's thoughts on her writing and an advertisement promoting one of her future publications. Cavendish concluded the collection by stating that she was aware that she did not write elegantly and that her phrasing and placement of words could be criticized. She said she had difficulty creating rhymes that could communicate her intended meaning. In short, Cavendish stated that she strove to keep meaning at the expense of elegance, as her aim was to successfully communicate her ideas. She also noted that she expected her work to be criticized for not being useful.

In response, she stated that she wrote not to instruct her readers in the arts, sciences or divinity, but to pass her time, asserting that she made better use of her time than many others. Cavendish returned to these assertions throughout her epistles and poems. Like authors such as Aphra Behn and William Wordsworth , Cavendish revealed much about her intended audience, writing purpose and philosophy in her prefaces , prologues , epilogues and epistles to the reader. Cavendish wrote several epistle dedications for Poems and Fancies.

The epistles were most often justifications of her writing both in terms of her decision to write at a time when women writers were not encouraged and in terms of her subject choice. Cavendish used the epistles to instruct readers how they ought to read and respond to her poetry, most often by inviting praise from supporters and requesting silence from those who did not like her work. Cavendish commonly used the epistles to call attention to and excuse potential weaknesses in her writing.

The epistles were directed to specific audiences and varied accordingly. In her epistle dedication to Sir Charles Cavendish, her brother in law, Cavendish compared writing poetry to spinning and described poetry as mental spinning. She noted that while it was commonly thought to be more appropriate for women to spin than to write, she herself was better at writing.

This is one of several occasions where Cavendish calls attention to stereotypical gender roles , such as the belief that women should spin and not write, and then expands upon her reasons for not adhering to them. As in this epistle, Cavendish often employed metaphors to describe her writing in terms of stereotypically feminine tasks or interests, such as spinning, fashion, and motherhood.

While Cavendish criticized her own work, she asserted that it would seem better if Sir Charles Cavendish looked favorably upon it. Cavendish often appealed to the reader to applaud her work, asserting that if it was well received it would actually be somewhat improved. She conclude by complimenting Charles' charity and generosity. In her epistle to noble and worthy ladies, as in many of her epistles, Cavendish straightforwardly expressed her desire for fame. Cavendish stated that she was not concerned that the best people like her writing, as long as many people did.

She justified this by linking fame to noise and noise to great numbers of people. Cavendish often assumed a defensive position in her epistles, here justified by her assertion that she expected critiques from males and females not only on her writing, but on her practice of writing itself, as women writers were not encouraged. To this Cavendish argued that women who busy themselves writing will not act inappropriately or gossip.

Though she anticipated criticism from females, she calls for female support so that she might gain honour and reputation. She closed by stating that if she should fail, she would see herself as being martyred for the cause of women. In her epistle to Mistress Toppe, Cavendish stated that her main reason for writing was her desire for fame. Again, Cavendish acknowledged her writing as a digression from accepted gender norms and asked for acceptance.

While Cavendish often spoke of her writing in metaphors of domestic or stereotypically feminine activities, here she attempted to excuse her desire for fame by distancing her ambition from the feminine. She described her ambition as a quest for glory, perfection, and praise, which, she stated, was not effeminate. Further, she pointed out that even while writing and pursuing fame she had remained modest and honourable and noted that she had done nothing to dishonour her family.

Cavendish attributed her confidence, in what she describes as a time of censor, to her belief that there was no evil, only innocence in her desire for fame. As to her writing without permission, Cavendish excused herself by stating that it was easier to get a pardon after the fact than to obtain permission before. She privileged writing over gossiping, which she treated as a common and negative female activity.

She considered writing to be a comparatively harmless pastime. She credited her books as tangible examples of her contemplation and contrasted her self-proclaimed harmless ideas with wild thoughts which, she stated, led to indiscreet actions. Cavendish explored writing closet dramas during her exile and became one of the most well known women playwrights due to her interest in philosophical nature. A response from Mistress Toppe follows this epistle in Poems and Fancies , in which Toppe praised Cavendish and her skill in poetical fiction, moral instruction, philosophical opinion, dialogue, discourses and poetical romances.

Cavendish also included a prefatory letter to natural philosophers.

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Cavendish stated that she did not know any languages except English, and that even her knowledge of English was somewhat limited, since she was familiar only with "that which is most usually spoke. Thus, she said, she lacked knowledge of the opinions and discourses which precede her own. She then dismissed any errors she might make as trivial, asserting that she did not mean her text to be taken as truth. Rather, she wrote simply to pass time and expected that her work would be read for the same purpose. This epistle was also the contained her explanation for writing in verse. She stated that poets were thought to write fiction, and that fiction was aligned with pastime, not truth.

Verse, then, was expected to contain errors. Cavendish lamented that her work was not more entertaining and advised readers to skip any part of the book that they did not like. In her epistle to the reader, Cavendish stated that with no children and, at that time, no estate, she had a lot of spare time. She, therefore, did not engage in housewifery, but filled her time with writing. She stated that good husbandry in poetry was well ordered fancy composed of fine language, proper phrases and significant words. Cavendish excused any errors that might be found in her work as due to her youth and inexperience, and explained that she wrote only to distract herself from thoughts of her husband's and her own hardships.

If, however, the book was well liked, she made it clear that she expected fame. In her epistle to the poets, Cavendish noted that since women seldom wrote, her own act of writing might be ridiculed, as the strange and unusual seem fantastical, the fantastical seems odd, and the odd seems ridiculous. She requested that her work be judged by reason, not prejudice. She then excused any weaknesses in her poetry by stating that she wrote only to get away from melancholy thoughts and to fill idle time. As was typical in her writing, applause was welcomed and criticism censored, as she advises those who did not like her poetry to keep silent.

She also stated that hers are poems of fancy and thereby required study. She recommended that as one with a troubled conscience ought to look to a minister for guidance, so should the reader ask a poet for help in understanding her poems. Attempting once again to guide the reader to a positive reception of her book, Cavendish drew a distinction between poets able judges of poetry and rhymers faulty judges of poetry and advised people not to say that her book was nonsense or poorly constructed out of their own ignorance and malice.

Returning again to her desire for fame, Cavendish noted that if an honest poet, who was not envious, judged her work, it would receive applause. Cavendish asked the reader to read her fancies poems slowly, paying attention to every word, because every word was a fancy itself.

She warned that if readers lost their place or missed lines, they would miss the meaning of the entire work. Cavendish followed some of her epistles with poems that instructed the reader how the poems came to be published and how they should be received. The proximity of the poems to the epistles and their similarity in subject and tone, suggests that they may be interpreted as being written from Cavendish's own point of view. The poem The Poetresses hasty Resolution , like many of Cavendish's epistles, contained excuses for any errors that might be found in the poet's work and begged for praise.

In the poem, the poet stated that self-love influenced her judgement of her own poetry, which she found she liked so much that she was moved to continue writing in hope of fame. She said that she wrote without thought about how her work would be received by critics. The poet then recalled how she was visited by Reason who advised her to stop writing. Reason told her that her writing was a waste of time, that her work would not be well received and that she should not have her work printed so that the printer would not lose money.

Reason also informed the poet that there were already too many books and that she should burn what she had written to spare the world from even more. The poet noted her angry response and stated that she sent her book to press before she could be persuaded otherwise. In hindsight, however, she regretted her actions. Informing the reader that she felt shamed by her writing, the poet told the reader to pity her and wipe away her tears with praise.

In The Poetresses Petition , she compared a negative reception to her books with their death. If the books suffered such a death i. Again, Cavendish would censor criticism and promote fame, instructing that only positive criticism should be voiced.