The Cambridge Companion to Mary Wollstonecraft

by Claudia L. Johnson (Editor)

Overview

Once viewed solely in relation to the history of feminism, Mary Wollstonecraft is now recognised as a writer of formidable talent across a range of genres, including journalism, letters and travel writing, and is increasingly understood as an heir to eighteenth-century literary and political traditions as well as a forebear of romanticism. The Cambridge Companion to Mary Wollstonecraft addresses all aspects of Wollstonecraft's momentous and tragically brief career. The diverse and searching essays commissioned for this volume do justice to Wollstonecraft's pivotal importance in her own time and since, paying attention not only to A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, but also to the full range of her work across disciplinary boundaries separating philosophy, letters, education, advice, politics, history, religion, sexuality, and feminism itself. A chronology and bibliography offer further essential information for scholars and students of this remarkable writer.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781139816366
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	05/30/2002
Series:	Cambridge Companions to Literature
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

Claudia L. Johnson is Professor of English at Princeton University. She is author of Jane Austen: Women, Politics and the Novel (1988) and Equivocal Beings: Politics, Gender, and Sentimentality in the 1790s (1995), and is currently working on Raising the Novel, which explores the history of novel studies and canon making from the late eighteenth century until the 1950s, and Jane Austen: Cults and Cultures, which examines the history of Austenian reception, representation, and memorialization as well as her place in the formation of various cultural, national, and even sexual identities.

Table of Contents

Chronology; Introduction Claudia L. Johnson; 1. Mary Wollstonecraft's letters Janet Todd; 2. Mary Wollstonecraft on education Alan Richardson; 3. Mary Wollstonecraft's Vindications and their political tradition Chris Jones; 4. Mary Wollstonecraft's French Revolution Tom Furniss; 5. Mary Wollstonecraft's literary reviews Mitzi Myers; 6. A Vindication of the Rights of Woman and the religious foundations of Mary Wollstonecraft's feminism Barbara Taylor; 7. Mary Wollstonecraft and the literature of advice and instruction Vivien Jones; 8. Mary Wollstonecraft's Vindication of the Rights of Woman and the woman writers of her day Anne K. Mellor; 9. Mary Wollstonecraft and the poets Susan J. Wolfson; 10. Mary Wollstonecraft's novels Claudia L. Johnson; 11. The art of travelling in Letters Written During a Short Residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark Mary A. Favret; 12. Mary Wollstonecraft and the sexuality of genius Andrew Elfenbein; 13. Mary Wollstonecraft's reception and legacies Cora Kaplan.

Editorial Reviews

Wollstonecraft was a relentless arguer in virtually all her writings, and this volume addresses a wide range of them. Fourteen articles by English professors at UK and US universities focus upon MW's letters, education writings, thoughts on the French Revolution, literary reviews, the political tradition of , the religious foundations of MW's feminism, her relationship to the literature of advice and instruction, other women writers and poets of her day, her novels, her relationship to sexuality, and her reception and legacies. An excellent aid to teaching the works of the controversial woman Horace Walpole called a and Blake referred to as a "Mary" persecuted by "foul Fiends." Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Booknews

"Johnson has assembled 14 essays by the leading scholars in the field to produce one of the most authoritative and wide-ranging studies of Wollstonecraft to date, one that treats not only the famous "Vindication" but also her novels, letters, travel writing, and political and religious though. The collection will prove most useful to upper-division undergraduates and beginning graduate students." Choice novel

From the Publisher