The founder of modern feminism, Mary Wollstonecraft (1759-1797) was the most famous woman of her era. A brilliant, unconventional rebel vilified for her strikingly modern notions of education, family, work, and personal relationships, she nevertheless strongly influenced political philosophy in Europe and a newborn America. Now acclaimed biographer Lyndall Gordon mounts a spirited defense of this courageous woman whose reputation has suffered over the years by painting a full and vibrant portrait of an extraordinary historical figure who was generations ahead of her time.

The] contradictions in Bronte] s] life are not only fully chronicled by Lyndall Gordon s splendid new biography, but also gracefully explicated to give the reader a vivid and emotionally detailed portrait of the novelist and her work. . . . Gordon] chooses to use her imaginative sympathies honed to precision with earlier biographies of Virginia Woolf and T. S. Eliot to delineate her subject s rich interior life. Michiko Kakutani, New York Times"

" M]easured, and brave in its imaginative interpretations." Carolyn Heilbrun, The New York Times Book Review This "original, intuitive, and even exciting" (The New Yorker) portrait highlights the experiences that shaped Virginia Woolf's life and art her childhood, her relationships with her father and sister, her marriage, and her descents into madness."

"Lives Like Loaded Guns...reads like a fabulous detective story... Gordon] takes us into undiscovered territory." --The Washington Post, a great companion to fans of the film A Quiet Passion, starring Cynthia Nixon as Emily Dickinson.
In 1882, Emily Dickinson's brother, Austin, began an adulterous love affair with the accomplished and ravishing Mabel Todd, setting in motion a series of events that would forever change the lives of the Dickinson family. Award-winning biographer Lyndall Gordon tells the story of the feud that erupted-and that still...