september 2010

the wordcurves press

editorial

John Fowles wrote on several occasions that the Odyssey was probably written by a woman, an opinion also supported by Samuel Butler and Robert Graves. In Wormholes JF notes the obsession by the Odyssey's author with domestic behaviour and domestic objects, a feminine point of view, which JF compares with the Lais of Mare de France.

This obsession with domestic activity is the over-riding strength of Mary S. Lovell's historical biography Bess of Hardwick : First Lady of Chatsworth (reprinted as Bess of Hardwick : Empire Builder). It is a phenomenal story about a woman who is widowed at 16, outlives four monarchs and three more husbands, dying one of the wealthiest and most powerful women England has ever seen. And how?

It has taken a woman, Mary S. Lovell, to provide for the first time detailed evidence from Bess's wills and documents: the key to this Tudor woman's remarkable success, fuelled by her obsession with domestic affairs.

To buy a copy of Bess of Hardwick : Empire Builder >>

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