A Passionate Sisterhood: The Sisters, Wives and Daughters of the Lake Poets [Kindle Edition]

Who'd be the wife of a great poet? Shakespeare left his and wrote sonnets to a young man instead. Shelley's, abandoned, pregnant and still almost a child herself, drowned herself. Byron preferred to sleep with his sister. Hardy only fell in love with his after her death. This very readable book gives you another side to the stories we all know about the Lake Poets. The poetry of Coleridge and Wordsworth is glorious, but they weren't nice to their womenfolk. Wordsworth leaves an abandoned mistress and child in France (maybe given the Revolution he couldn't have married her - but it leaves a nasty taste inthe mouth) Coleridge abandoned his too - the intelligent and educated Sarah Fricker, for another Sarah, whose life he seems to have more or less ruined too. Dorothy of course was famously in love with her brother, but you can't help feeling that an interesting and original mind sacrificed herself on the altar of William-worship. His wife Mary barely seems to have had an independent existence. Then there were the daughters. poor Dora, sent to boarding school at the age of four (four!) for being difficult - then not being allowed to marry until it was almost too late; the gifted Sarah Coleridge - she at least was able to write. But after Coleridge's defection, the family was looked after by the lesser poet Southey. He at least seems to have been nicer to his womenfolk, but he didn't believe in educating them too far.'Literature cannot be the business of a woman's life, and it ought not to be!' he said to Charlotte Bronte. Of these women, I was most interested in Sarah Fricker Coleride , dismissed as a nothing by Dorothy Wordsworth and of course by Coleridge. But she survived her trials with equanimity and humour, even composing a mad imaginary language which almost anticipates Lewis Carroll. What might she not have done if fate hadn't made her the wife of a poet?
I very much enjoyed reading this book - the field of the Lake poets is a well-trampled one, but Kathleen Jones has uncovered stories and lives too long hidden.

Avril Joy `A Passionate Sisterhood,' is the fascinating story of the women who lived with the Lake Poets - Southey, Coleridge and Wordsworth and their complex relationships with both the men and with each other. Inspired by the author's discovery in the archives of Dove Cottage of the largely unpublished journals of Dorothy Wordsworth this is a story previously untold. And what a story!
For biography to work for me I have to trust the biographer and I need to be captivated by the story - both are true of `A Passionate Sisterhood.' Kathleen Jones approaches her subjects with meticulous care, firstly presenting us with the well- ordered facts and chronology and constantly referring to sources in particular Dorothy's Journals, the letters between the women and the poetry. This is no mean feat in itself. And I am in awe of the work that researching and writing a biography of this calibre and breadth entails.
One of the things I particularly like about `A Passionate Sisterhood,' is that although the author leaves us to draw our own conclusions about the women and their often seemingly incestuous relationships we are also allowed to feel her concerns: the ill-treatment of his wife Sarah by Coleridge, Dorothy Wordsworth's unacknowledged skill as a writer - evident in her Journal entries and her contribution to her brother's writing (later denied by him), the sheer hardships of these women's lives....all of these are painted large and give us the hidden story that so fascinated the writer herself.
For me this insight into the lives of the women and the realities of everyday life is what makes the story so captivating from the beginning. I was hooked from the start: fascinated but appalled by the addiction to laudanum, the high infancy mortality rates, the amount of mental illness the women suffered - perhaps unsurprising when one considers the death of so many of their children, the physical deprivations including toothache, the climate, the often inadequate housing and the sheer distances they walked.
`A Passionate Sisterhood,' can be purchased for less than £3.00 on Kindle - which is in itself outrageous and makes it a bargain not to be missed, but having read it on Kindle I find it's a book I want to buy a hard copy of, especially with its beautiful cover. It is a gripping, all -consuming read and I have to echo Val Hennessy in the Daily Mail who says `it is the stuff your English teacher never told you...told with enthralling vividness.'

The Lake Poets had long been a literary set I had never tackled, to my shame. When this book was chosen as a Book Club read I thought I would be able to make up this lack. Instead I feel profoundly grateful that I never fell for Wordsworth (revealed as egocentric), Coleridge (selfish and cowardly) or whoever the other one was. The impact of their great art on the lives of their unfortunate sisters, wives and daughters was largely destructive. Only Southey comes out as a loving father and responsible husband. Kathleen Jones navigates the confusing intermarriages and shared names of this fascinating group of people with assurance, making an easy and enjoyable read out of what could have been a confusing narrative, especially as this is a joint biography. Hard to put down. Besides being confirmed in my distrust of the poetry I learnt a great deal about social history, the strange prevalence of illness in women, the dire effects of laudanum and the amazing distances people habitually walked. What was most harrowing was the repeated losses of children; this was a harrowing chapter which had me in tears. Thoroughly recommended.