Scan barcode
kathydavie's review
5.0
It rates a "5" for how well Moore wrote, although I would dearly love to give it a -5 for her subject! I hate to think what Moore's state of mind was upon finishing this...
A biography about the Georgian poet, Stoic, philosopher, and hypocrite—Thomas Day.
My Take
Right out, I'm telling you that I greatly disliked the subject of this biography. My god, the man was an egotistical, selfish, rude, obnoxious hypocrite. Moore did write this very well---it read like a story. Only, it's a story I kept wanting to put down. The more I read, the more I despised Thomas Day.
The best I can say about his story [as opposed to Moore's story *grin*] is that I enjoyed the connections with scientists, thinkers, and writers.
The way in which Rousseau's Émile was distorted out of context and how many children had to suffer because their parents were nuts! I'm so angry with Richard Edgerton for putting his son through this and then abandoning him when it wasn't Dick's fault! Arghhhh!! The one benefit to it was that Edgerton tried to find a compromise between the previously accepted method of educating children and Rousseau's general theory, and eventually he and his daughter Maria wrote Practical Education, a book that influenced education for decades and promoted "educational toys, models, books, maps, and scientific apparatus" in the playroom.
A poet, Day, and his best friend, John Bicknell, wrote The Dying Negro. Day later went on to write a popular children's series, Stanford and Merton, which promoted "innocent virtue and stoical courage".
Other friends included Richard Warburton-Lytton who helped found Oxford's Grecian Club, and William "Oriental" Jones, an expert linguist, who was translating the Arabian Nights back into Arabic.
Erasmus Darwin (Charles' grandfather) was part of the Lunar Society of Birmingham (dubbed the Lunaticks) whose other members include James Watt of steam engine fame; Matthew Boulton, an industrialist; the potter Josiah Wedgwood; Dr. William Small, who was the closest to a father figure Day had; the vicious and selfish writer Anna Seward; and, James Keir, who was a chemist and inventor.
Part of the oddness of this story is Moore's assuring us that so many people liked Day, and yet, it's all tell. Which probably isn't a fair comment as this isn't fiction. But it doesn't change the fact that I don't understand why anyone would like the man. He had no manners and would hold forth forever on his ideas, running roughshod over anyone.
The heart of this story is Thomas Day, a young man-turned-Stoic as a result of his time at boarding school. And what a nut job! It's appalling that his friends all went along with his "enlightened attempt" to "educate"---hah, torture and abuse is more like it!---the perfect mate for this selfish, hypocritical jerk. He wanted a woman who would slavishly hang on his every word, accept it as law, and be willing to undergo the most horrible hardships—Day was greatly influenced by Rousseau's Émile and took Rousseau's words as hard-and-fast rules—giving up all forms of enjoyment, and be willing to live totally isolated in the worst sort of house. Oh, god, just thinking of it has me furious all over again. I'd love to get my hands on that ass! Naturally, Day continued his socializing and the pursuit of his interests. Only his wife must be willing to give up her writing, music, socializing, family, and any other enjoyments, so that she could cater to all his needs.
A philosopher and poet, Day soon determined to "become the very model of the model virtuous man". He was also determined to "create" the model of a perfect mate and was influenced by Ovid's Metamorphoses and the myth of Pygmalion. Ovid's story and the books Seward and Edgerton wrote about Day's experiments with Sabrina influenced George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion, Fanny Burney's Evelina, Henry James' Watch and Ward, Maria Edgeworth's Belinda, and Anthony Trollope's Orley Farm.
Ann Kingston was how the London Foundling Hospital named the baby they accepted; Day renamed her Sabrina Sidney. Ann Grig, the second orphan who became Lucretia, got lucky fast. Sabrina's friends included Dr. Charles Burney, a musician who eventually opened up a boy's school in Greenwich. She eventually took over managing the Burney School whose students included James Haliburton, Thomas Foxwell Buxton---and Thomas Griffiths Wainewright.
The best you can say of the man is that he was generous with his money to the poor and friends whose businesses needed a loan; was anti-slavery; pro-education; and, thought women were equal to men, insisting on protecting them whether they wanted it or not...
...as long as you weren't his idea of a mate!
Interesting side mentions included David Hume; Laurence Sterne (we keep meeting him in Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series); Marquis de Sade; Captain Thomas Coram who founded the London Foundling Hospital; John Constable who married one of Sabrina's nieces, Maria Bicknell; Samuel Johnson; Mary Wollstonecraft; Joseph Wright; a fascinating reveal about John André who has appeared in a couple of other books I've recently read—C.C. Humphreys' Jack Absolute and Donna Thorland's The Turncoat (odd that Humphreys and Thorland both depict André as gay, but Moore only mentions that his proposal was rejected by Honora Sneyd); Benjamin Franklin; and, the Americans, Henry and John Laurens. The comment about the Rhône in Avignon as a refuge for upper-class people on the run was interesting.
The Cover
The cover is curious with its geometric splits: the two shades of beige for the general background cuts the primary title from the subtitle and the author's name, nothing unusual there. It's the four slices through the 18th century figure of a woman that have me wondering. What's the purpose? I have to wonder if it's a subtle indication of the different stages of Day's interference with Sabrina.
The title sums up the entire story as it's Thomas Day's theory on How to Create the Perfect Wife: Britain's Most Ineligible Bachelor and His Enlightened Quest to Train the Ideal Mate. Pay attention to italics on the book's cover---there's irony in every word!
A biography about the Georgian poet, Stoic, philosopher, and hypocrite—Thomas Day.
My Take
Right out, I'm telling you that I greatly disliked the subject of this biography. My god, the man was an egotistical, selfish, rude, obnoxious hypocrite. Moore did write this very well---it read like a story. Only, it's a story I kept wanting to put down. The more I read, the more I despised Thomas Day.
The best I can say about his story [as opposed to Moore's story *grin*] is that I enjoyed the connections with scientists, thinkers, and writers.
The way in which Rousseau's Émile was distorted out of context and how many children had to suffer because their parents were nuts! I'm so angry with Richard Edgerton for putting his son through this and then abandoning him when it wasn't Dick's fault! Arghhhh!! The one benefit to it was that Edgerton tried to find a compromise between the previously accepted method of educating children and Rousseau's general theory, and eventually he and his daughter Maria wrote Practical Education, a book that influenced education for decades and promoted "educational toys, models, books, maps, and scientific apparatus" in the playroom.
A poet, Day, and his best friend, John Bicknell, wrote The Dying Negro. Day later went on to write a popular children's series, Stanford and Merton, which promoted "innocent virtue and stoical courage".
Other friends included Richard Warburton-Lytton who helped found Oxford's Grecian Club, and William "Oriental" Jones, an expert linguist, who was translating the Arabian Nights back into Arabic.
Erasmus Darwin (Charles' grandfather) was part of the Lunar Society of Birmingham (dubbed the Lunaticks) whose other members include James Watt of steam engine fame; Matthew Boulton, an industrialist; the potter Josiah Wedgwood; Dr. William Small, who was the closest to a father figure Day had; the vicious and selfish writer Anna Seward; and, James Keir, who was a chemist and inventor.
Part of the oddness of this story is Moore's assuring us that so many people liked Day, and yet, it's all tell. Which probably isn't a fair comment as this isn't fiction. But it doesn't change the fact that I don't understand why anyone would like the man. He had no manners and would hold forth forever on his ideas, running roughshod over anyone.
The heart of this story is Thomas Day, a young man-turned-Stoic as a result of his time at boarding school. And what a nut job! It's appalling that his friends all went along with his "enlightened attempt" to "educate"---hah, torture and abuse is more like it!---the perfect mate for this selfish, hypocritical jerk. He wanted a woman who would slavishly hang on his every word, accept it as law, and be willing to undergo the most horrible hardships—Day was greatly influenced by Rousseau's Émile and took Rousseau's words as hard-and-fast rules—giving up all forms of enjoyment, and be willing to live totally isolated in the worst sort of house. Oh, god, just thinking of it has me furious all over again. I'd love to get my hands on that ass! Naturally, Day continued his socializing and the pursuit of his interests. Only his wife must be willing to give up her writing, music, socializing, family, and any other enjoyments, so that she could cater to all his needs.
A philosopher and poet, Day soon determined to "become the very model of the model virtuous man". He was also determined to "create" the model of a perfect mate and was influenced by Ovid's Metamorphoses and the myth of Pygmalion. Ovid's story and the books Seward and Edgerton wrote about Day's experiments with Sabrina influenced George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion, Fanny Burney's Evelina, Henry James' Watch and Ward, Maria Edgeworth's Belinda, and Anthony Trollope's Orley Farm.
Ann Kingston was how the London Foundling Hospital named the baby they accepted; Day renamed her Sabrina Sidney. Ann Grig, the second orphan who became Lucretia, got lucky fast. Sabrina's friends included Dr. Charles Burney, a musician who eventually opened up a boy's school in Greenwich. She eventually took over managing the Burney School whose students included James Haliburton, Thomas Foxwell Buxton---and Thomas Griffiths Wainewright.
The best you can say of the man is that he was generous with his money to the poor and friends whose businesses needed a loan; was anti-slavery; pro-education; and, thought women were equal to men, insisting on protecting them whether they wanted it or not...
...as long as you weren't his idea of a mate!
Interesting side mentions included David Hume; Laurence Sterne (we keep meeting him in Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series); Marquis de Sade; Captain Thomas Coram who founded the London Foundling Hospital; John Constable who married one of Sabrina's nieces, Maria Bicknell; Samuel Johnson; Mary Wollstonecraft; Joseph Wright; a fascinating reveal about John André who has appeared in a couple of other books I've recently read—C.C. Humphreys' Jack Absolute and Donna Thorland's The Turncoat (odd that Humphreys and Thorland both depict André as gay, but Moore only mentions that his proposal was rejected by Honora Sneyd); Benjamin Franklin; and, the Americans, Henry and John Laurens. The comment about the Rhône in Avignon as a refuge for upper-class people on the run was interesting.
The Cover
The cover is curious with its geometric splits: the two shades of beige for the general background cuts the primary title from the subtitle and the author's name, nothing unusual there. It's the four slices through the 18th century figure of a woman that have me wondering. What's the purpose? I have to wonder if it's a subtle indication of the different stages of Day's interference with Sabrina.
The title sums up the entire story as it's Thomas Day's theory on How to Create the Perfect Wife: Britain's Most Ineligible Bachelor and His Enlightened Quest to Train the Ideal Mate. Pay attention to italics on the book's cover---there's irony in every word!
thefullbronte's review
4.0
Haiku:
Enlightened Mr. Day
Bends a young girl to his will.
She’s worth ten of him.
Enlightened Mr. Day
Bends a young girl to his will.
She’s worth ten of him.
tessisreading2's review
5.0
Well-written, at times screamingly funny and at other times screamingly horrifying, this book was a compelling read about an enormous jackass and his hapless victims. The narrative moves swiftly, Moore gives a good sense of characters and "life and times" without getting bogged down in extraneous detail or distracted from the primary narrative, and she adds just enough censorious commentary that I didn't have to scream "What a jackass!" at the book more than, like, twice, because she was doing that for me (in obviously a more professional and witty way).
kathleenww's review
5.0
Ms Moore has obviously done extensive research in assembling such a detailed and interesting story out of such an apparently abhorrent subject. My eye was caught by the almost absurd title of this book while on the Internet one day, and the cover illustration (reminiscent of my 1970's Fashion Plate toy) also pulled me in. I love Jane Austen and the Brontes, so naturally, I was curious what this book was truly about. Do not let the title fool you, this is a serious study of one man's completely misguided attempt to create the perfect mate for himself.
Thomas Day was inspired by Jean-Jacques Rosseau's work Emile (or On Education) published in 1762, which asserted that every child is born with an innate goodness, but is corrupted by society and it's constraints (religion, education, etc.). The work was highly controversial, and was banned in Paris that same year. Day decided to take this work and apply its principals to a real life situation (the book is a fictional experiment in which a child is raised in a completely natural and unschooled manner). Day managed to coerce a good friend, John Bicknell, to help him obtain not one, but two "apprentices" under false pretenses from an English orphanage. These two young women, renamed Sabrina and Lucretia for Day's own purposes. As orphanages during the Georgian era were bursting with children so many poor of the population had given up, unable to care for them, few questions were asked (although records were kept). Day's tightly knit circle of eccentric friends were supportive and willing to help him in his bizarre endeavors, no single person cited in this book seemed to question what Day was doing, except Rosseau himself. Day's close friend Richard Lovell Edgeworth even attempted his own version of the experiment on his own child, Dick, which was ultimately a great failure.
The premise of this book seems outrageous to us, of course, and it was also thought to be so by most of his friends at the time, since the young ladies were kept quite in the dark throughout their entire "education" at the hands of Day, but it also seems to verge on being criminal to our contemporary minds. Day was an eccentric character: pompous, annoying, hard to relate to by most who knew him, though loved by his true friends, and by Sabrina, who knew little else of love and caring in the world.
I was completely engrossed by this book. The society that Day was involved in was educated and open minded (obviously), and while Day's behavior would certainly not be rewarded today, but punished, the cast of character was fascinating and interesting, both male and female alike. Moore doesn't just tell Day's story, but that of Sabrina and eventually her family. Moore explains many aspects of Georgian culture. I found her in depth description of orphanages at the time to be heart wrenching. Moore also discusses Rosseau's philosophy and its misapplication and how it has affected education today.
If you are a reader of Jane Austen, Mary Shelley, the Romantic poets, or Maria Edgeworth (daughter of Day's close friend) or even Charles Dickens or William Makepeace Thackeray, this book should be of great interest to you, and I highly recommend it. Very readable, and a compelling story of education gone awry.
Thomas Day was inspired by Jean-Jacques Rosseau's work Emile (or On Education) published in 1762, which asserted that every child is born with an innate goodness, but is corrupted by society and it's constraints (religion, education, etc.). The work was highly controversial, and was banned in Paris that same year. Day decided to take this work and apply its principals to a real life situation (the book is a fictional experiment in which a child is raised in a completely natural and unschooled manner). Day managed to coerce a good friend, John Bicknell, to help him obtain not one, but two "apprentices" under false pretenses from an English orphanage. These two young women, renamed Sabrina and Lucretia for Day's own purposes. As orphanages during the Georgian era were bursting with children so many poor of the population had given up, unable to care for them, few questions were asked (although records were kept). Day's tightly knit circle of eccentric friends were supportive and willing to help him in his bizarre endeavors, no single person cited in this book seemed to question what Day was doing, except Rosseau himself. Day's close friend Richard Lovell Edgeworth even attempted his own version of the experiment on his own child, Dick, which was ultimately a great failure.
The premise of this book seems outrageous to us, of course, and it was also thought to be so by most of his friends at the time, since the young ladies were kept quite in the dark throughout their entire "education" at the hands of Day, but it also seems to verge on being criminal to our contemporary minds. Day was an eccentric character: pompous, annoying, hard to relate to by most who knew him, though loved by his true friends, and by Sabrina, who knew little else of love and caring in the world.
I was completely engrossed by this book. The society that Day was involved in was educated and open minded (obviously), and while Day's behavior would certainly not be rewarded today, but punished, the cast of character was fascinating and interesting, both male and female alike. Moore doesn't just tell Day's story, but that of Sabrina and eventually her family. Moore explains many aspects of Georgian culture. I found her in depth description of orphanages at the time to be heart wrenching. Moore also discusses Rosseau's philosophy and its misapplication and how it has affected education today.
If you are a reader of Jane Austen, Mary Shelley, the Romantic poets, or Maria Edgeworth (daughter of Day's close friend) or even Charles Dickens or William Makepeace Thackeray, this book should be of great interest to you, and I highly recommend it. Very readable, and a compelling story of education gone awry.
hauteclere's review
4.0
An interesting story of a foundling who transcends her "benefactors" Rousseau-inspired excesses. Full of very interesting people brought to life with skill by the author, giving you a glimpse of life amongst the intellectual and social upper middle class of 18th century Britain.
jerihurd's review
4.0
Wow. Some people really feel entitled. A very interesting read, but difficult because you end up hating Day sooooo much. I wanted to smack him for being an a**hole and smack the women for letting him treat them so brutally. It wasn't just 18th C attitudes, but also a look into the subjugation of another human being by someone who wants total dominion over thought, word and deed.
readbooks_fightpatriarchy's review
4.0
Fascinating story of a man who seems equal parts maddening and impossible
melanieapril's review
5.0
I had never heard of the writer Thomas Day or his much-mythologized, Pygmalion quest to train a wife before reading this biography, but wow, what an incredible story. Well-researched and funny - I can't recommend this book enough.