3 Review(s)

This is a major new edition of the most stimulating and authoritative textbook on early modern women currently available. Merry Wiesner has updated and expanded her prize-winning study; she summarises the very latest scholarship in her chapters and bibliographies, adding new sections on topics such as sexuality, masculinity, the impact of colonialism, and women's role as consumers. Other themes investigated include the female life-cycle, literacy, women's economic role, artistic creation, female piety - and witchcraft - and the relationship between gender and power. The clear and helpful structure of the first edition remains: it reflects the tripartite division of the self - mind, body, and spirit - traditional in western philosophy. Coverage is geographically broad; the second edition includes longer discussions of the border areas, such as Russia, Ireland, and the Iberian peninsula. Accessible, engrossing, and lively, this book will be of central importance for courses in gender history, early modern Europe, and comparative history.