Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present
Caroline Herschel
-
Standard Name: Herschel, Caroline
Used Form: Carolina Lucretia Herschel
During the later eighteenth century CH
perhaps surprised herself by adding to the role of a domestic family woman those of performer and then scientist. Her writings fall into two related groups: singularly self-effacing diaries, letters, and memoirs or family history, and astronomical writings. She continued to write in these genres until decades into the nineteenth century.
"Caroline Herschel" Retrieved from https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f1/1829_Melchior_Gommar_Tieleman%2C_%C3%96lgem%C3%A4lde_Caroline_Herschel_Hannover.tif/lossy-page1-836px-1829_Melchior_Gommar_Tieleman%2C_%C3%96lgem%C3%A4lde_Caroline_Herschel_Hannover.tif.jpg.
AA
was a close friend of Sir John Herschel
(another photographic pioneer) and his daughters. The idea of a female scientist was not strange to this family, since Sir John was the nephew of the...
Friends, Associates
Georgiana Cavendish Duchess of Devonshire
Georgiana later met the scientist Sir Charles Blagden
. She is said to have acquired from him her lasting interest in chemistry and mineralogy, though she had already indicated some interest in science by visiting...
Friends, Associates
Mary Somerville
In London the Somervilles enjoyed participating in a rich scientific community: Mary's time there was much happier than during her first marriage. She attended many lectures at the Royal Institution
, and took lessons in...
She was admitted at the same time as Lady Huggins
, who wrote a tribute to her following her death.
Commire, Anne, and Deborah Klezmer, editors. Women in World History: A Biographical Encyclopedia. Yorkin Publications, 1999–2002, 17 vols.
832
The three women who had been previously admitted into the Society were Caroline Herschel
Reception
Mary Somerville
After conducting a series of trials which involved focussing sunlight on a steel needle, MS
concluded (incorrectly) that the violet rays of the solar spectrum appeared to produce a magnetising effect. The paper was timely...
Reception
Mary Somerville
Mary Somerville
and Caroline Herschel
were awarded honorary memberships by the Royal Astronomical Society
(until recently called the Astronomical Society of London).
Phillips, Patricia. The Scientific Lady. Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1990.
115
They were its first women members.
Textual Features
Elizabeth Ogilvy Benger
EOB
writes in terms of a women's tradition: for instance, she praises Barbauld
for praising Elizabeth Rowe
. She makes confident judgements and attributions (she is sure that Lady Pakington
is the real author of...
A Memoir and Correspondence of Caroline Herschel appeared well after its subject's death and almost a century after her career in astronomy had begun, with a preface written by GJ
but attributed to Mary Cornwallis Herschel
Textual Production
Emma Marshall
EM
also proposed to Seeley
trying a shilling paper-cover book.
Marshall, Beatrice. Emma Marshall. Seeley, 1900.
206
Her first of these became The Tower on the Cliff, A Story founded on a Gloucestershire Legend, 1886, which was warmly praised by...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text
Clara Balfour
She devotes a chapter to each woman of sterling qualities . . . . in the hope that studious habits, intellectual pursuits, domestic industry, and sound religious principles, may be promoted and conformed by such...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text
Matilda Betham-Edwards
Her selection of subjects is interesting and original. Her six are the English scholar and translator Elizabeth Carter
, the Hanoverian (English by adoption) astronomer Caroline Herschel
, the Dutch explorer of Africa Alexandrine Tinné
Theme or Topic Treated in Text
Agnes Mary Clerke
In The Herschels and Modern Astronomy she focuses on what she presents as the devoted and almost heroic work of William Herschel
and his son Sir John
. In relating the achievements of Caroline Herschel
Theme or Topic Treated in Text
Adrienne Rich
The title of this volume is excerpted from American poet Charles Olson
's The Kingfishes.
Rich, Adrienne. The Will to Change. Norton, 1971.
prelims
Some of Rich's poems articulate the political meaning in personal experience, like The Burning of Paper Instead of...
Timeline
3 November 1703: John Tipper, a schoolmaster of Coventry,...
Building item
3 November 1703
John Tipper
, a schoolmaster of Coventry, wrote to Humfrey Wanley
about his projected Ladies' Diary, or The Woman's Almanack.
Adburgham, Alison. Women in Print: Writing Women and Women’s Magazines from the Restoration to the Accession of Victoria. George Allen and Unwin Ltd., 1972.
45-52
White, Cynthia L. Women’s Magazines 1693-1968. Michael Joseph, 1970.
25
Ellis, Sir Henry, editor. Original Letters of Eminent Literary Men of the Sixteenth, Seventeenth, and Eighteenth Centuries. Camden Society, 1843.
304-14
Suarez, Michael F. “The Business of Literature: The Book Trade in England from Milton to Blake”. A Companion to Literature from Milton to Blake, edited by David Womersley, Blackwell, 2000, pp. 131-47.
144
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
13 March 1781: Astronomer William Herschel discovered the...
Building item
13 March 1781
Astronomer William Herschel
discovered the existence of the planet Uranus: he had already discovered several previously unknown comets, as his sister Caroline
did soon afterwards.
Radford, Tim. “Light fantastic at the end of the universe”. Guardian Weekly, 1 Mar. 2000, p. 19.
19
Stephen, Sir Leslie, and Sidney Lee, editors. The Dictionary of National Biography. Smith, Elder, 1908–2024, 22 vols. plus supplements.
1835: Caroline Herschel and Mary Somerville were...
