PURE WIT: The Revolutionary Life of Margaret Cavendish

'My ambition is not only to be Empress, but Authoress of a whole world.' A biography of the remarkable, and in her time scandalous, 17th century writer Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle Margaret Cavendish, then Lucas, was born in 1623 to a wealthy family. In 1644, as England descended into civil war, she joined the court of the formidable Queen Henrietta Maria at Oxford, by April 1667 she was the talk of London society, before following the court into exile in France. It was there that she met her much older lifelong partner, William Cavendish, Marquess of Newcastle-upon-Tyne. Cavendish was a revolutionary writer. At the first performance of The Humorous Lovers, a play everyone believed was by her though in fact it was written by her husband, the Duke of Newcastle, Margaret had chosen an extravagantly provocative outfit, a dress so low-cut that her breasts were "all laid out to view, complemented with "scarlet trimmed nipples". Samuel Pepys was hardly immune to the general fascination with her. At a time when literature was dominated by men, she wrote passionately on gender, science and philosophy, defied convention by publishing under her own name, and advocated for women in work that predates the feminist movement. In 1666, she published The Blazing World, a brilliant, trail-blazing proto-novel thought to be one of the earliest works of science fiction. But her legacy divides opinion and history has largely forgotten her. Francesca Peacock recounts Cavendish's ordeals as a monarchist under Cromwell, her years in exile in Paris, her supportive marriage, her ennoblement and fame. 8 pages of illus. incl. colour, 360 pages.