Celebrating women’s writing: the pen in their hands

Frontispiece to Phillis Wheatley's Poems on Various Subjects...

This section presents a small, miscellaneous set of resources related to women's writing and writing women. You can find much more in our library.
The essay Celebrating women’s writing: the pen in their hands by Professor Ros Ballaster provides context and discussion, and points to further resources that you can explore. We hope they will give you a sense of the richness and variety of women’s creativity.
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In the 1980s feminism changed the study of literature forever when it challenged what we term the 'canon' of literature: the list of names we accord a kind of 'sainthood' in our histories of literature. Up until then, the names were those of men, usually white, aristocratic or middle class. Women scholars observed that it was not that women had not been writing poetry, fiction, and prose as long as men had, but that they had not received the same recognition or circulation.

Read the essay: Celebrating women's writing: the pen in their hands by Ros Ballaster

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Public Domain

#	Title	Description	Contributor
1	Brighton Ambitious: Some Fragments, a play by Maria Edgeworth	A performance of the play, Brighton Ambitious: Some Fragments, by Maria Edgeworth.	Ellen B. Brewster, Ros Ballaster
2	Literature and Gender, 1660-1760	In this introductory lecture, Kathleen Keown considers representations of gender in the...	Kathleen Keown
3	What's so great about Austen? Isn't she just bonnets and balls?	Some film and tv adaptations of Jane Austen's novels might give the impression that the...	Sandie Byrne
4	Jane Austen's Manuscripts Explored	Professor Kathryn Sutherland from the University of Oxford talks around the manuscripts of Jane...	Kathryn Sutherland
5	Mary Leapor	Dr Jennifer Batt talks about Mary Leapor, an 18th Century kitchen maid who wrote accomplished...	Jennifer Batt
6	Olive Schreiner	Professor Elleke Boehmer gives a talk on Olive Schreiner (1855-1920), the South African novelist...	Elleke Boehmer
7	Katherine Mansfield and Rhythm Magazine	Dr Faith Binckes explains why modernist short story writer and critic Katherine Mansfield (1888-...	Faith Binckes
8	George Eliot - A Very Large Brain	Dr Catherine Brown gives a talk on George Eliot and her influences	Catherine Brown

#	Title	Description	Contributor
1	Women Poets	Dr Jane Potter looks at a range of women poets who wrote during, and in the years that followed...	Jane Potter
2	Elleke Boehmer's The Shouting in the Dark and Other Southern Writings	Emma Parker interviews Elleke Boehmer about her award-winning novel The Shouting in the Dark...	Elleke Boehmer, Emma Parker
3	Male memory, female subject: the case of Jane Austen and Mary Wollstonecraft	Janet Todd gives the keynote lecture at the Silence in the Archives conference held at Wolfson...	Janet Todd
4	The Women who 'Meant to Do It': George Eliot and Celebrity Performance	The novelist Patricia Duncker gives the keynote lecture at the Life-Writing and Female Celebrity...	Patricia Duncker
5	Virginia Woolf's To The Lighthouse	Laura Salisbury and Sowon Park give a talk about Virginia Woolf's To The Lighthouse. The chair...	Sowon Park, Laura Salisbury, Ben Morgan
6	What's so great about Austen? Isn't she just bonnets and balls?	Some film and tv adaptations of Jane Austen's novels might give the impression that the...	Sandie Byrne
7	The real Jane Austen: A life in small things	Biographer Paula Byrne (Perdita: The Life of Mary Robinson and Mad World: Evelyn Waugh and the...	Paula Byrne
8	Postcolonial Women Writers	Professor Elleke Boehmer notes the distinct lack of women writers on the Post/Colonial Writing...	Elleke Boehmer, Dominic Davies
9	Mary Leapor	Dr Jennifer Batt talks about Mary Leapor, an 18th Century kitchen maid who wrote accomplished...	Jennifer Batt
10	English and Gender	Professor Deborah Cameron explores some of the key theories surrounding the use of language by...	Deborah Cameron
11	Mary Shelley - Journal of Sorrow	Part of the Shelley's Ghost Exhibition. In the months immediately following Shelley's...	Nouran Koriem
12	Mary Wollstonecraft - A Vindication of the Rights of Woman	Part of the Shelley's Ghost Exhibition. In her most famous work Mary Wollstonecraft argued...	Annabell James

#	Essay Title	Description	Contributor
1	Celebrating women's writing: the pen in their hands	In the 1980s feminism changed the study of literature forever when it challenged what we term...	Ros Ballaster
2	Tour: Women's Writing	Feminists argue that writing by women has been by and large undervalued by literary culture for...	Alex Pryce
3	Feminist Approaches to Literature	This essay offers a very basic introduction to feminist literary theory, and a compendium of...	Kate O'Connor
4	Olive Schreiner	Daughter of a German missionary father and British mother, Olive Schreiner (1855-1920) was born...	Dominic Davies
5	The Anonymous Jane Austen	Jane Austen (1775-1817) is one of the most famous authors in the western canon (possibly helped...	Kate O'Connor
6	Who is Aphra Behn?	This essay is the first of four distilled from a lecture series on Aphra Behn given by...	Abigail Williams, Kate O'Connor
7	Frances Burney: the "Mother of English Fiction"	By Kate O'Connor Before there...	Kate O'Connor

#	Title	Description	Author
1	The female advocate: or an attempt to recover the rights of women from male usurpation. By Mary Anne Radcliffe.	ebook version of The female advocate: or an attempt to recover the rights of women from male...	Radcliffe, Mary Ann, 1745?-1810.
2	A vindication of the rights of woman: with strictures on political and moral subjects. By Mary Wollstonecraft.	ebook version of A vindication of the rights of woman: with strictures on political and moral...	Wollstonecraft, Mary, 1759-1797.
3	The Life of Charlotte Brontë	ebook version of The Life of Charlotte Brontë	Gaskell, Elizabeth Cleghorn, 1810-1865
4	Woolf on Behn	Chapter four of Virgina Woolf's critical text 'A Room of One's Own' discusses the influence and...	Virginia Woolf
5	Oroonoko: or, the Royal Slave		Aphra Behn
6	A Room of One's Own		Virginia Woolf
7	Love-letters between a nobleman and his sister; with the history of their adventures. In three parts.	The fourth edition. The epistle dedicatory to parts II and III signed: A. B. i.e....	Aphra Behn
8	Jane Eyre : an autobiography	By Currer Bell [pseud.] In three volumes ... 2nd ed.. Publisher Details:...	Charlotte Brontë
9	Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell.	By the Brontë sisters (pseudonymously) Publisher Details: Lond. Smith Elden and co. ...	Charlotte Brontë
10	Woman and Labour	Includes: Thoughts on South Africa [1923], Stories, Dreams and Allegories [1923], The Letters of...	Olive Schreiner
11	Poems by the Most Eminent Ladies of Great Britain and Ireland. Vol I	Originally published as: Poems by Eminent Ladies. On title page: "Re-...
12	Poems by Eminent Ladies. Vol II	Poems by eminent ladies : particularly: Mrs. Barber, Mrs. Behn, Miss Carter, Lady Chudleigh, Mrs...

#	Resource Title	Description	Contributor
1	Phillis Wheatley	Engraving of Phyllis Wheatley part of frontispiece to her 'Poems on Various Subjects...'....
2	Pride and Prejudice title page	The title page of the Richard Bentley edition of of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, the first...
3	Steventon Rectory	Engraving of Steventon rectory, home of the Austen family during much of Jane Austen's lifetime...
4	Jane Austen's House in Chawton	Jane Austen lived here, in Chawton, during her final years.	Rudi Riet
5	Manuscript of 'A route of evanescense'	Original manuscript of Emily Dickinson's (1830-1886) poem "A route of evanescense" which she...
6	Emily Dickinson Poems Book Cover
7	Southerne Oroonoko 1776 Performance	Handout of 1776 performance of Oroonoko Scan of public domain document. Published 23...
8	Katherine Mansfield
9	Aphra Behn by John Riley	Engraving of Aphra Behn after a lost portrait by John Riley (1646-1691)
10	Aphra Behn by Mary Beale	Portrait of Aphra Behn by Mary Beale (1632-1699)
11	Charlotte Brontë	Painted by Duyckinick, Evert A. Portrait Gallery of Eminent Men and Women in Europe and America...
12	Anne Brontë	Anne Brontë - drawing in pencil by Charlotte Brontë, 1845

#	Resource Title	Description	Contributor
1	Phillis Wheatley	The Wikipedia article about Phillis/Phyllis Wheatley contains information about her life and...	Wikipedia
2	A Play in Fragments by Maria Edgeworth - A Surviving Manuscript	The surviving manuscript of an unpublished play by Maria Edgeworth c.1811, found in MS Eng misc...	Ellen B. Brewster, Ros Ballaster

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Celebrating women’s writing: the pen in their hands