
The Bluestockings
A History of the First Women's Movement
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Narrated by:
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Fenella Fudge
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By:
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Susannah Gibson
About this listen
An illuminating group portrait of the 18th-century women who dared to imagine an active life for themselves in both mind and spirit.
In England in the 1700s, a woman who was an intellectual, spoke out, or wrote professionally was considered unnatural. After all, as the wisdom of the era dictated, a clever woman—if there were such a thing—would never make a good wife. But a circle of women called the Bluestockings did something extraordinary: Coming together in glittering salons to discuss and debate as intellectual equals with men, they fought for women to be educated and to have a public role in society.
In this intimate and revelatory history, Susannah Gibson delves into the lives of these pioneering women. Elizabeth Montagu established one of the most famous salons of the Bluestocking movement, with everyone from royalty to revolutionaries clamoring for an invitation to attend. Her younger sister, Sarah Scott, imagined a female-run society and created a women’s commune. Meanwhile, Hester Thrale, who also had a salon, saved her husband’s brewery from bankruptcy and, after being widowed, married a man she loved—Italian, Catholic, and not of her social class. Other women made a name for themselves through their publications, including Catharine Macaulay, author of an eight-volume history of England, and Frances Burney, author of the audacious novel Evelina.
In elegant prose, Gibson reveals the close and complicated relationships between these women, how they supported and admired each other, and how they sometimes judged and exploited one another. Some rebelled quietly, while others defied propriety with adventurous and scandalous lives. With moving stories and keen insight, The Bluestockings uncovers how a group of remarkable women slowly built up an eviscerating critique of their male-dominated world that society was not yet ready to hear.
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Half of all 7,000-plus human languages may disappear over the next century, and when they're gone, it will be forever. Ross Perlin, a linguist and codirector of the Manhattan-based non-profit Endangered Language Alliance, is racing against time to map little-known languages across the most linguistically diverse city in history: contemporary New York.
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Fascinating Read
- By annei on 06-02-24
By: Ross Perlin
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Do Something
- Coming of Age Amid the Glitter and Doom of '70s New York
- By: Guy Trebay
- Narrated by: Edoardo Ballerini
- Length: 6 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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Born in the Bronx, Guy Trebay was raised in an atmosphere of privilege on Long Island’s North Shore after his entrepreneurial father struck business gold with Hawaiian Surf, a wildly successful cologne company that capitalized on the optimism of the 1960s as marketed to “an adventurous new breed of men.’’ But behind the facade of material prosperity lay the emotional disarray of a household dominated by a charismatic, con artist father, a glamorous yet lost and careless mother, a family haunted by tragedy.
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Heartache and heartbreak and the will to survive.
- By Polly B. on 07-05-24
By: Guy Trebay
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The Woman They Could Not Silence
- One Woman, Her Incredible Fight for Freedom, and the Men Who Tried to Make Her Disappear
- By: Kate Moore
- Narrated by: Kate Moore
- Length: 14 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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1860: As the clash between the states rolls slowly to a boil, Elizabeth Packard, housewife and mother of six, is facing her own battle. The enemy sits across the table and sleeps in the next room. Her husband of 21 years is plotting against her because he feels increasingly threatened - by Elizabeth’s intellect, independence, and unwillingness to stifle her own thoughts. So Theophilus makes a plan to put his wife back in her place. One summer morning, he has her committed to an insane asylum.
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Everyone should read this!
- By Lana S on 12-22-21
By: Kate Moore
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Black River
- By: Nilanjana Roy
- Narrated by: Sharmila Devar
- Length: 11 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Teetapur, an unassuming village just a few hours outside of bustling Delhi, is famous for nothing—until one of its children, eight-year-old Munia, is found dead, hanging from the branch of a Jamun tree. In the largely Hindu village, suspicion quickly falls on an itinerant Muslim man, Mansoor. Suspicion ignites like wildfire, fueled by religious tensions that simmer beneath the surface.
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Good but not a mystery
- By ascot on 10-11-24
By: Nilanjana Roy
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Great Expectations
- A Novel
- By: Vinson Cunningham
- Narrated by: Aaron Goodson
- Length: 6 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
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A historic presidential campaign changes the trajectory of a young Black man’s life in this “coming of age story that captures the soul of America” (The Washington Post), the debut novel from The New Yorker staff writer and Pulitzer Prize finalist Vinson Cunningham.
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Not the political story I expected
- By Aeroduncan on 12-19-24
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The Barbizon
- The Hotel that Set Women Free
- By: Paulina Bren
- Narrated by: Andi Arndt
- Length: 9 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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Welcome to New York’s legendary hotel for women, the Barbizon. Liberated after WWI from home and hearth, women flocked to New York City during the Roaring Twenties. But even as women’s residential hotels became the fashion, the Barbizon stood out; it was designed for young women with artistic aspirations, and included soaring art studios and soundproofed practice rooms. More importantly still, with no men allowed beyond the lobby, the Barbizon signaled respectability, a place where a young woman of a certain class could feel at home.
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A Very Enjoyable Non Fiction, Mostly Easy Listening
- By Frank Donnelly on 03-23-21
By: Paulina Bren
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Someone Like Us
- A Novel
- By: Dinaw Mengestu
- Narrated by: Junior Nyong'o
- Length: 8 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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After abandoning his once-promising career as a journalist in search of a new life in Paris, Mamush meets Hannah—a photographer whose way of seeing the world shows him the possibility of finding not only love but family. Now, five years later, with his marriage to Hannah on the verge of collapse, he returns to the close-knit immigrant Ethiopian community of Washington, DC, that defined his childhood. At its center is Mamush’s stoic, implacable mother, and Samuel, the larger-than-life father figure whose ceaseless charm and humor have always served as a cover for a harder, more troubling truth.
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Not ideal as an audiobook
- By Kate Liburdi on 04-09-25
By: Dinaw Mengestu
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The Mysterious Case of the Alperton Angels
- A Novel
- By: Janice Hallett
- Narrated by: Annie Aldington, Nneka Okoye, Gareth Armstrong, and others
- Length: 10 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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Everyone knows the story of the Alperton Angels: the cult who brainwashed a teenage girl into believing her baby was the anti-Christ. When the girl came to her senses and called the police, the Angels committed suicide and mother and baby disappeared.
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Actor chewing noises disgusting. Did not finish.
- By Schwarzian on 03-12-24
By: Janice Hallett
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Headshot
- A Novel
- By: Rita Bullwinkel
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 5 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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An unexpected tragedy at a community pool. A family’s unrelenting expectation of victory. The desire to gain or lose control; to make time speed up or stop; to be frighteningly, undeniably good at something. Each of the eight teenage girl boxers in this blistering debut novel has her own reasons for the sacrifices she has made to come to Reno, Nevada, to compete to be named the best in the country.
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Wonderful Narrator
- By love it on 08-09-24
By: Rita Bullwinkel
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The Coin
- A Novel
- By: Yasmin Zaher
- Narrated by: Sarah Agha
- Length: 6 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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The Coin’s narrator is a wealthy Palestinian woman with impeccable style and meticulous hygiene. And yet the ideal self, the ideal life, remains just out of reach: her inheritance is inaccessible, her homeland exists only in her memory, and her attempt to thrive in America seems doomed from the start. In New York, she strives to put down roots. She teaches at a school for underprivileged boys, where her eccentric methods cross boundaries. She befriends a homeless swindler, and the two participate in an intercontinental scheme reselling Birkin bags.
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Interview of author on podcast piqued interest
- By amybarnard on 08-03-24
By: Yasmin Zaher
What listeners say about The Bluestockings
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- braingirl
- 08-13-24
fascinating book almost ruined by the reader
the histories are interesting and we'll researched and fun but the reading is exhaustingly dramatic. most annoying, she uses girlish, timid voices whenever she quotes these almost radically progressive women. when she voices a child it's just embarrassing. the book is well written. we don't need that much interpreting in our behalf.
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- Margaret
- 01-09-25
Everyone should read this (or listen)!
I don't usually write reviews. But this book is wonderful. It is well written, well researched, and also entertaining. I am so glad I listened to this one. The narrator also does a great job, and lets one sink into the story.
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- Katster
- 01-19-25
Excellent book and truly excellent reader.
The reader’s voice was absolutely perfect, and the books information was interesting, entertaining, and informative.
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