Bluestockings cover art

Bluestockings

The First Women's Movement

 Preview
Try Premium Plus free
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
£8.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

Bluestockings

By: Susannah Gibson
Narrated by: Fenella Fudge
Try Premium Plus free

£8.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

Buy Now for £12.99

Buy Now for £12.99

Confirm Purchase
Pay using card ending in
Switch payment method
By completing your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and authorise Audible to charge your designated card or any other card on file. Please see our Privacy Notice, Cookies Notice and Interest-based Ads Notice.
Cancel

About this listen

 'Sophisticated, rich and skilful . . . highlights the extraordinary place these women carved out for themselves against the odds' New Statesman

'Remarkable . . . The Bluestockings bust out of the pages with unmistakable glee . . . their complexity and individuality shine through' BBC History

'Spirited, lively and scholarly' Literary Review

'A story of sisterhood and empowerment' PHILIPPA GREGORY

In Britain in the 1750s, women had no power and no rights - all money and property belonged to their fathers or husbands. A brave group risked everything to think and live as they wished, despite the sneers of contemporaries who argued that books frazzled female brains and damaged their wombs.

Meet the Bluestockings:

ELIZABETH MONTAGU hosted a series of glittering salons in her London drawing room, where a circle of women and men discussed theatre, philosophy and the classics, competing to outdo each other in wit and brilliance. Discover how she took on Voltaire and won.

Whilst nursing twelve children and helping run her bullying husband's brewery, HESTER THRALE took key writers under her wing - Dr Johnson moved into her house for several years. Her vivid diaries offer a powerful chronicle of what happened when she finally decided to follow her heart.

Find out how poetess and former milkmaid ANN YEARSLEY fought back when her snobbish patron refused to hand over her earnings because she was working class and thus irresponsible . . .

Or how CATHERINE MACAULEY's eight volume history of England caused such a sensation that she became a leading light in the American Revolution - while her unorthodox love-life scandalised her contemporaries . . .

In this brilliant book, Susannah Gibson explores the lives and legacies of these and other figures who went on to inspire writers and thinkers from Mary Wollstonecraft to Virginia Woolf and lead the way for feminism.

Bluestockings: the unexpected and inspiring stories of the forgotten heroines of Britain's very first women's movement.©2024 Susannah Gibson (P)2024 Hodder & Stoughton Limited 18th Century Gender Studies Modern Social Sciences Women Marriage Inspiring England
All stars
Most relevant  
Lively, engaging and detailed account of the world of these women and how they connected to each other and to famous names of the time. The impact of these women on Mary Wollstonecraft in particular and on later generations of women writers is astutely recognised. The narration by Fenella Fudge is fabulous - clear and expressive.

Excellent retelling of the lives and times of these women

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Reading this book feels like being right there in the middle of all the Bluestockings, with their stories, successes and tragedies. What a wonderful way to immerse yourself in history! There are so many parallels to today and it puts women's movements in much better context for me.
The narration is brilliant and so fitting for this book. I'd recommend this book wholeheartedly.

So joyful, interesting and reflective

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
A fascinating telling of the lives of these remarkable and very interesting women. Very well researched and beautifully told by Susannah Gibson.

A Beautiful Account of the lives of the Bluestockings.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
A remarkable book that introduces the extraordinary movement of women and charts their osmosis into a Women’s Movement. A subject of history all too little presented and studied. Would highly recommend this work. The author is to be applauded.

Clarity of thought. Fast moving.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.