Description

A major historical document and a supreme collection of love letters, this book reveals Dorothy Osborne (1627-94/5) to be one of the most remarkable women of the seventeenth century.

The letters bring to life for us every stage of her long courtship and marriage to William Temple (1628-98)-- a marriage implacably opposed by both familiesfor many years. Since Temple was a leading essayist, the patron of Swift and perhaps the greatest diplomat of his day, we are given a uniquely authentic picuture of the personalities and daily life of both the literary world and the country gentry in turbulent times. Osborne was a razor-sharp observer of the social scene, a born writer and a woman with some strikingly modern ideas about love, marriage and the family. Her letters provide a marvellously complete and touching self-portrait and amply confirm Kenneth Parker's claim in his invaluable introduction, that she possessed an extraordinary ability to 'retain her sense of her own integrity, as a woman: a feminist before feminism'.

A major historical document and a supreme collection of love letters, this book reveals Dorothy Osborne (1627-94/5) to be one of the most remarkable women of the seventeenth century.The letters bring to life for us every stage of her long courtship and marriage to William Temple (1628-98)-- a marriage implacably opposed by both familiesfor many years. Since Temple was a leading essayist, the patron of Swift and perhaps the greatest diplomat of his day, we are given a uniquely authentic picuture of the personalities and daily life of both the literary world and the country gentry in turbulent times. Osborne...  Read More