Conversations centers on the maternal Mrs. Bryant (referred to in the text as "Mrs. B") and her two students, Caroline and Emily. This is the backdrop providing a snapshot of the general understanding of chemistry in the early 1800s. The sharing of scientific content through such dialogue was important to Marcet's readers; indeed, she came to write not only Conversations on Chemistry but also Conversations on Political Economics as well as Conversations on Natural Philosophy. As she stated in her preface to Conversations on Chemistry, she took on the question of whether such material was...