A Literary History of Women's Writing in Britain, 1660–1789

"...takes on more than the telling of a story of literary development. It gestures toward placing its account of writing in the context of social and political history....It openly asserts the importance of evaluation, declaring it a primary principle of inclusion....Her book makes ample reference to a range of modern criticism, offers an excellent critical bibliography, an even supplies a list of good modern editions. The ambition of her enterprise is awe-inspiring; so are the energy and scrupulosity with which she pursues it....Each chapter opens, helpfully, with a list of the works it discusses and their dates, followed by a brief review of political and social actualities in the years under study. Abundant subheadings help the reader keep track of the chapter's topics....Staves summarizes expertly, enabling her readers to assess the place and importance of even unfamiliar works....The book lends itself well to use as a reference work....Staves displays her greatest powers when discussing women who have received less literary attention....Staves provides incontrovertible evidence of multifarious literary accomplishments by eighteenth-century women and organizes her account of them into an orderly narrative of development....Her book provides valuable information, an important record..."
--Patricia Meyer Spacks, University of Virginia, Modern Language Quarterly

"...her account of 129 years of women's writing promises to redirect the future course of feminist literary history....Her book tells a story of the "rise of the woman writer," whose combined achievements and compromises she calls "bittersweet." Her history is consistently useful and inspiring from its Introduction to its select Bibliography....exemplifies a new direction for the history of eighteenth-century women's writing."
--Deborah Heller, Western New Mexico University, The Scriblerian