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jsjammersmith's review
5.0
I'm profoundly disappointed that few readers have read and reviewed this book because it's simply wonderful. This was one of the book assigned to a graduate history class I was auditing, and while I didn't get a chance to read it then, I decided to try it now and review it for my history podcast and I can say with no hesitation that I simply devoured this book.
Jennifer Ward is a wonderful scholar and writer and she demonstrates concern for both of these aspects as she tries to understand the lives of noblewomen during this period. Rather than resort to speculation, Ward gives her reader facts and real substantial analysis of the documents that we have access to. and these observations then translate into fascinating narratives about these women who lived and worked their manors securing political, religious, cultural, and personal capital.
The narrative of women in Medieval Europe is usually reduced to tragedies of dissatisfaction, sickness, sexual assault, and death, but Ward offers her reader something more. WOmen assume a real agency in this book so that the image that has often appeared in Medieval fantasies and narratives is left behind. Ward shows her reader that rather than mere second class citizens, women in this culture lived their lives and lived them fully sometimes achieving real and significant achievements.
English Noblewomen in the Later Middle Ages is a chance to expand the narratives of women's lives throughout history, and scholars and even average readers will find something to love in this book.
Jennifer Ward is a wonderful scholar and writer and she demonstrates concern for both of these aspects as she tries to understand the lives of noblewomen during this period. Rather than resort to speculation, Ward gives her reader facts and real substantial analysis of the documents that we have access to. and these observations then translate into fascinating narratives about these women who lived and worked their manors securing political, religious, cultural, and personal capital.
The narrative of women in Medieval Europe is usually reduced to tragedies of dissatisfaction, sickness, sexual assault, and death, but Ward offers her reader something more. WOmen assume a real agency in this book so that the image that has often appeared in Medieval fantasies and narratives is left behind. Ward shows her reader that rather than mere second class citizens, women in this culture lived their lives and lived them fully sometimes achieving real and significant achievements.
English Noblewomen in the Later Middle Ages is a chance to expand the narratives of women's lives throughout history, and scholars and even average readers will find something to love in this book.
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