 Word On Books
with Jeremy Fenton
Catch up on the Byron Bay Writers Festival 2002 here!
Emma Darwin
by Edna Healey
 When Emma Wedgwood (from the famed pottery family) married Charles Darwin in 1839, it was three years after his return from the famed voyage aboard the Beagle that would provide much of the inspiration for his subsequent work on natural selection that so enlarged our understanding of how life evolves.
While the Beagle voyage has been justly celebrated, the role Darwin's spouse played in the theory's development and publication has thus far been mostly ignored except for inane statements like 'behind every great man, there is a great woman'.
Darwin himself is said to have referred to his wife as 'twice refined gold'.
'She is infinitely my superior in every single moral quality - my wise advisor and cheerful comforter through life - she has earned the love and admiration of every soul near her'.
Edna Healey (author of Lady Unknown: Life of Angela Burdett-Coutts and The Queen's House: The History of Buckingham) in her new book Emma Darwin - The Inspirational Wife of a Genius, goes so far as to suggest that it was Emma who was a driving force behind the seminal work On the Origin of Species.
Amazingly, this is the first time that Emma Darwin has been the subject of a biography in her own right - with the fascinating result testifying to her worthiness of attention.
Though not an authorised (read: biased usually) biography, Healey did have access to primary source material through the Darwin family archives. Much of the material she draws upon has never been made available before, so even those who are familiar with her husband's life will find that this biography sheds new light on the Darwin family.
The days are thankfully fast drawing to a close when you could ask people to name famous women in history, and, apart from Marie Curie, they looked either awkward or bemused.
Emma Darwin is a wonderfully informative and well-written biography (that includes some excellent black and white pictures) for anyone interested in the evolution of scientific thought on our origins, and the place that women have played in history when living in the shadow of a great men.
Ann the Word
by Richard Francis, Published by 4th Estate
 What strange and bizarre plans the fates (or God if you will) had in store for the little illiterate blacksmith's girl born in Manchester's Toad Lane in 1736.
Ann Lee become one of the most powerful (and despised) religious women of her time, founding a new Christian sect called the Shakers and crossing the Atlantic to, supposedly, live in peace to practice the 'Word of God' as she experienced it.
Part visionary, part self-confessed (self-confused?) messiah and tyrant, the charismatic Ann Lee was an indomitable woman who rose far above her 'low-born' origins to pursue her astounding path in life, and in the process was beaten and branded a heretic and witch (amongst other travails).
The whirling dervish dancing, raucous singing, talking in tongues, celibacy, falling about in ecstasy and craftsmanship that characterised the Shakers, make Ann Lee's story one of the most interesting in the annuals of breakaway Christian sects.
Whether the once-thriving Shakers are ultimately remembered for their faith or for their incredible skill in furniture making is debatable - but Richard Francis's book should go some way towards rescuing the compelling story of their main mover and shaker, Ann Lee.
Like many other powerful women in history, this is the first self-contained biography of Ann Lee - and it is mesmerising reading.
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