Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon: Feminist, Artist and Rebel
Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon was the most unconventional and influential leader of the Victorian women's movement. Enormously talented, energetic and original, she was a feminist, law-reformer, painter, journalist, the close friend of George Eliot and a cousin of Florence Nightingale. As a painter, Barbara is now recognised as a vital figure among Pre-Raphaelite women artists. As a feminist she led four great campaigns: for married women's legal status, for the right to work, the right to vote and to education. Making brilliant use of unpublished journals and letters, Pam Hirsch has written a biography that is as lively and powerful as its subject, recreating the woman in all her moods, and placing her firmly in the context of women's struggle for equality.
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I cannot recommend this book highly enough. For those seeking to understand the evolution of thought regarding women's higher education in England in the Victorian period this book is essential reading. However, the book also delves in great detail into the social fabric of the times, setting Bodichon both within the context of wider artistic and cultural movements and within the evolution of early feminist thought and action. The book is written with an enviable clarity of style, is thoroughly researched and adds very considerably to studies of this fascinating period. A 'must read'
School of Education Studies
Dublin City University.
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