A Glorious Fame: The life of the Duchess of Newcastle

by Kathleen Jones

Margaret Cavendish was the first English woman to write specifically for publication and to consider herself primarily a writer. She cloaked her crippling shyness in extravagant dress and an exotic public persona. A feminist long before her time, she believed in sexual equality, criticised the role that society assigned to women and even questioned the institution of marriage. Although she, like virtually all women of her time, had little formal education, she wrote, with atrocious spelling, stories, poems, essays, ‘fancies’ and scientific and philosophical treatises. So controversial was her reputation that when she visited London, crowds lined the streets to watch her pass. She was a solitary, gifted and outlandish figure.Margaret lived at one of the most exciting and turbulent times in British history. She was only a young girl when civil war broke out in England. Her family were Royalist supporters who lost everything - their house was pulled down by an armed mob and the family graves looted. Margaret’s mother was imprisoned and later died. Two of Margaret’s brothers died in battle. She herself became a fugitive, following the Queen into exile in Paris as one of her ‘waiting women’. Though Margaret was only the daughter of a gentleman, she caught the eye of William Cavendish, Duke of Newcastle and - fearing the Queen’s displeasure - conducted a secret romance until they were able to marry. She lived with him in exile until the Restoration of Charles II in 1660.

Genres: Biography, Nonfiction

192 pages, Hardcover

First published March 3, 1988

About the author

I was brought up on a remote hill farm in the English Lake District. I started writing as a teenager, publishing small pieces in local magazines and newspapers, fanzines and teenage mags such as ‘Jackie’. I married very early and started travelling the world with my husband, had four children, worked in broadcasting in the middle east, and became a single parent. Back in the UK I went to university as a mature student, and wrote my first book which I was lucky enough to have published by Bloomsbury. Since then I’ve managed to (almost!) make a living as a writer, teaching creative writing pt-time to pay the bills.

I’ve probably made it sound easy, but it wasn’t. I know I’ve been incredibly lucky to be published and to be able to share what I love doing most with other people. Now I live with a sculptor who is working in Italy and so I spend as much time there as I can. It’s a bit of a scramble sometimes - a crazy life - but I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Reviews

[Christina Baehr · Rating 4 out of 5]

More thoughts soon, but I was really impressed by the depth and breadth of research. Her bibliography alone is an amazing source.

[Kathleen Jones]

This has recently been re-released on Kindle with new illustrations. Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle, was one of the very first women to write books for publication and was considered mad and immoral for allowing her work to appear in print. She had a very eventful life - living through the English civil war. Her family home was razed to the ground by Cromwell's troops, two of her brothers killed, and she escaped to France to join the court of Queen Henrietta in Paris, where she met her husband. She was only a gentleman's daughter, Newcastle was a friend of the king and one of the greatest landowners in England, so there was a lot of opposition to their marriage. It was a genuine love match and Newcastle (a cavalier author himself) encouraged his wife to write and paid for publication of her work.

A Glorious Fame was my first book. It grew out of a documentary I was writing for the BBC and someone suggested that it was so interesting it might make a biography. So I began writing it in my spare time, studying for a university degree during the day. It was very hard work, but I got a contract with Bloomsbury Publishing - which I was very pleased about - and I've been a full time author since then, though I've had to do a bit of creative writing tuition now and then to pay the bills.

[Jade · Rating 2 out of 5]

50% English politics
30% Newcastle’s biography
10% “Margaret may have been the first woman to publish for its own sake, but she wasn’t even that good”
10% Waffle