The Poets’ Daughters: Dora Wordsworth and Sara Coleridge
In this riveting and absorbing book, Katie Waldegrave examines the intertwining lives of Dora Wordsworth, daughter of the great Romantic poet, William, and Sara Coleridge, daughter of his charismatic but unstable friend, the poet and critic Samuel Taylor, and shows the disastrous effects of the two powerful male egos on their respective daughters. What struck me forcibly was how confined the girls’ lives were. They had little formal education compared with their brothers; their womanly duties (nursing, household etc.) were interminable and any aspirations they might have had were largely unacknowledged by their families. Dora’s role was to be her father’s prop and amanuensis. As she grew up, the unhealthy stranglehold of their relationship exacted a heavy price on her health. Sara was highly intellectual. Today, her editing of her father’s literary legacy is praised as ‘the very model of rigorous editing’, but, in the 1840s, to be female and intellectual was a contradiction in terms. Sara struggled to be heard.
Sara and Dora’s friendship was enduring and high-prized by both. We follow them as they grow up, find love, brave male disapproval, and struggle for autonomy in a world where women’s achievements simply don’t count. Highly recommended.
