The Bluestocking Circle: Women, Friendship, And The Life Of The Mind In Eighteenth-Century England

Features of The Bluestocking Circle: Women, Friendship, and the Life of the Mind in Eighteenth-Century England

This book traces the rise development and decline of the Bluestocking Circle between 1740 and 1800 through a close analysis of the lives and works of the women who made up the group Drawing substantially on previously unpublished information and quoting widely from the groups letters to each other Professor Myers supplies fresh detail on the relationships social lives and writings of the circle There has been considerable controversy recently about the nature of the womens relationships within the group Some have seen them as romantic friends wouldbe lesbians or as women whose friendships existed on a lesbian continuum Professor Myers believes that these views distort the reality the circle was a group of friends men as well as women who felt intellectually and emotionally supportive rather than romantic about each other The Bluestocking Circle examines a field rich in human and literary interest and aims to significantly deepen our knowledge of 18thcentury women