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Good Wives

Image and Reality in the Lives of Women in Northern New England, 1650-1750

Author Laurel Thatcher Ulrich
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Paperback
$17.00 US
Knopf | Vintage
5.2"W x 7.9"H x 0.8"D  
On sale Jun 04, 1991 | 336 Pages | 9780679732570
Grades 9-12 + AP/IB
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Winner of the Colonial Dames of America Award

This enthralling work of scholarship reveals the hidden and not always stoic face of the “goodwives”  of Colonial America. We encounter the awesome burdens and considerable power of a New England housewife's domestic life and witness her occasional forays into the world of men. Painstakingly researched and lively with scandal and homely detail, this is history at its best.

“A major addition to our historical understanding of women in colonial New England . . . a pathbreaking depiction of wives and mothers.” —Kathryn Kish Sklar

“[Ulrich] makes a modern reader understand what it would have been like to have been born female in early New England. . . . A truly remarkable achievement.” —Mary Beth Norton, Cornell University

“Professor Ulrich makes a convincing case that although New England women did not hold church power, their participation in the community was not defined by a systematic ideology of femininity such as existed in the 19th century. Assembling evidence from court records, probate inventories and a variety of other sources, she shows how the rigors of colonial life, combined with the Puritan notion of spiritual equality in marriage, led women to a range of activity overlapping that of men.” —The New York Times
© Stephanie Mitchell

LAUREL THATCHER ULRICH is the author of numerous works on early American history and women's history, including A Midwife's Tale, which won the 1991 Pulitzer Prize in History and became the subject of a PBS documentary film. A former MacArthur Fellow and past President of the American Historical Association, she retired from Harvard University in 2018 as 300th Anniversary University Professor. She now lives in Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania. Her online courses "Tangible Things" and "Women Making History" can be found at HarvardX.

View titles by Laurel Thatcher Ulrich

Part One: Bathsheba
1. The Ways of Her Household
2. Deputy Husbands
3. A Friendly Neighbor
4. Pretty Gentlewoman

Part Two: Eve
5. The Serpent Beguiled Me
6. Consort
7. Travail
8. Mother of All Living

Part Three: Jael
9. Blessed Above Women
10. Viragoes
11. Captives
12. Daughters of Zion

Afterword
"[Ulrich] makes a modern reader understand what it would have been like to have been born female in early New England...a truly remarkable achievement." -- Mary Beth Norton, Cornell University

A gravestone in northern New England proclaims that a woman was "Eminent for Holiness...Prudence, Sincerity...Meakness...Weanedness From ye World...Publick-Spiritedness ...Faithfulness & Charity."

"A major addition to our historical understanding of women in colonial New England...a path-breaking depiction of wives and mothers." -- Kathryn Kish Sklar, S.U.N.Y., Binghamton

About

Winner of the Colonial Dames of America Award

This enthralling work of scholarship reveals the hidden and not always stoic face of the “goodwives”  of Colonial America. We encounter the awesome burdens and considerable power of a New England housewife's domestic life and witness her occasional forays into the world of men. Painstakingly researched and lively with scandal and homely detail, this is history at its best.

“A major addition to our historical understanding of women in colonial New England . . . a pathbreaking depiction of wives and mothers.” —Kathryn Kish Sklar

“[Ulrich] makes a modern reader understand what it would have been like to have been born female in early New England. . . . A truly remarkable achievement.” —Mary Beth Norton, Cornell University

“Professor Ulrich makes a convincing case that although New England women did not hold church power, their participation in the community was not defined by a systematic ideology of femininity such as existed in the 19th century. Assembling evidence from court records, probate inventories and a variety of other sources, she shows how the rigors of colonial life, combined with the Puritan notion of spiritual equality in marriage, led women to a range of activity overlapping that of men.” —The New York Times

Author

© Stephanie Mitchell

LAUREL THATCHER ULRICH is the author of numerous works on early American history and women's history, including A Midwife's Tale, which won the 1991 Pulitzer Prize in History and became the subject of a PBS documentary film. A former MacArthur Fellow and past President of the American Historical Association, she retired from Harvard University in 2018 as 300th Anniversary University Professor. She now lives in Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania. Her online courses "Tangible Things" and "Women Making History" can be found at HarvardX.

View titles by Laurel Thatcher Ulrich

Table of Contents


Part One: Bathsheba
1. The Ways of Her Household
2. Deputy Husbands
3. A Friendly Neighbor
4. Pretty Gentlewoman

Part Two: Eve
5. The Serpent Beguiled Me
6. Consort
7. Travail
8. Mother of All Living

Part Three: Jael
9. Blessed Above Women
10. Viragoes
11. Captives
12. Daughters of Zion

Afterword

Praise

"[Ulrich] makes a modern reader understand what it would have been like to have been born female in early New England...a truly remarkable achievement." -- Mary Beth Norton, Cornell University

A gravestone in northern New England proclaims that a woman was "Eminent for Holiness...Prudence, Sincerity...Meakness...Weanedness From ye World...Publick-Spiritedness ...Faithfulness & Charity."

"A major addition to our historical understanding of women in colonial New England...a path-breaking depiction of wives and mothers." -- Kathryn Kish Sklar, S.U.N.Y., Binghamton

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