| Title | : | Kindred Nature: Victorian and Edwardian Women Embrace the Living World |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 0226284425 |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9780226284422 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Hardcover |
| Number of Pages | : | 312 |
| Publication | : | First published February 15, 1999 |
In Kindred Nature, Barbara T. Gates highlights the contributions of Victorian and Edwardian women to the study, protection, and writing of nature. Recovering their works from the misrepresentation they often faced at the time of their composition, Gates discusses not just well-known women like Beatrix Potter but also others—scientists, writers, gardeners, and illustrators—who are little known today.
Some of these women discovered previously unknown species, others wrote and illustrated natural histories or animal stories, and still others educated women, the working classes, and children about recent scientific advances. A number of women also played pivotal roles in the defense of animal rights by protesting overhunting, vivisection, and habitat destruction, even as they demanded their own rights to vote, work, and enter universities.
Kindred Nature shows the enormous impact Victorian and Edwardian women had on the natural sciences and the environmental movement, and on our own attitudes toward nature and human nature.
Some of these women discovered previously unknown species, others wrote and illustrated natural histories or animal stories, and still others educated women, the working classes, and children about recent scientific advances. A number of women also played pivotal roles in the defense of animal rights by protesting overhunting, vivisection, and habitat destruction, even as they demanded their own rights to vote, work, and enter universities.
Kindred Nature shows the enormous impact Victorian and Edwardian women had on the natural sciences and the environmental movement, and on our own attitudes toward nature and human nature.
Kindred Nature: Victorian and Edwardian Women Embrace the Living World Reviews
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I really enjoyed this book! It’s borrowed and I mostly skim-read it, but it’s beautiful. The academic argument is complex—the ways views about women AS nature shaped both women’s interactions with nature and how they were able to write or interact with and shape our understanding of it. Based in the 19th and early 20th century, it introduced me to a huge number of fascinating (white and wealthy) British women. They loved nature, wanted to be scientists, advocated for animals and plants, wrote stories and poetry, painted and collected and were vital to the 19th century British experience of that thing they called “nature.” I loved the stories and the descriptions. And the photos and drawings are worth the price of admission.
