The Cambridge Guide to Women's Writing in English

Description

This Guide aims to consolidate and epitomise the re-reading of women's writing that has gone on in the last twenty-five years. This is an opportunity for stock-taking - a timely project, when so much writing has been rediscovered, reclaimed and republished. There are entries on writers, on individual texts, and on general terms, genres and movements, all printed in a single alphabetical sequence. The earliest written documents in medieval English (the visionary writings of Julian of Norwich and Margery Kempe) are covered in an historical - and geographical - sweep that takes us up to the present day. The book reflects the spread of literacy, the history of colonisation and the development of post-colonial cultures using and changing the English language. The entries are written by contributors from all the countries covered. The result is a work of reference with a unique feeling for the vitality, wealth and diversity of women's writing.

'This is an admirable collection, put together by an editor who knows so much about women's writing, from different times, and from all over the world. There are all kinds of surprises and delights here. A book for browsing through, a bedside book.' Doris Lessing 'There are few books that one can say, on oath, that this has not been done before but as there has been, thus far, only one Lorna Sage, nothing as learned, as witty and wise as her Guide to Women's Writing has appeared before the new millennium.' Gore Vidal 'This new guide is exhilarating: it ranges deep and wide, weaving a tremendous tapestry of women's writing, of their lives, scholarship, opinions, imagination, struggles and triumphs. The entries are spirited, acute, packed with fresh insights sparked by the latest research. The culmination of the last two decades's work in literary history and theory, it should make all those who love English literature exult that, contrary to rumour, the subject is thriving.' Marina Warner 'A really useful guide to a body of writing that cuts across traditional literary categories and geographical boundaries.' David Lodge ' ... features nearly 2,400 short articles on writers, their writings and the genres to which they contribute ... some two dozen entries on genres and sub-types recognize the importance of 'minor' prose genres such as the diary, travel writing, and even cookery books, the last sorely neglected in most treatments of women's writing.' The Times Literary Supplement