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Born Margaret Lucas, she was the youngest sister of prominent Royalists, Sir John Lucas and Sir Charles Lucas. She became an attendant of Queen Henrietta Maria, and travelled with her into exile in France, living for a time at the court of the young king Louis XIV. She became the second wife of William Cavendish, Duke of Newcastle in 1645, when he was a mere Marquis. He was immensely rich, and was appointed governor of the Prince of Wales by King Charles I of England, but was dismissed in the course of the political machinations leading up to the English Civil War. At the RestorationThe English Restoration or simply Restoration was an episode in the history of Great Britain beginning in 1660, when the monarchy was restored under King Charles II after the English Civil War. Theatres reopened after having been closed during the protect in 1660Events January 1 colonel George Monck with his regiment crosses from Scotland to England at the village of Coldstream and begins advance towards London in support of English Restoration February 2 George Monck and his regiment arrive in London February 23, he was made a duke, and his wife became a duchess. She had a great ear for gossip, and it is the intimate secrets of her contemporaries that are the main point of interest in her work.
She was a poetPoets are authors of poems. Poets are often regarded as imaginative thinkers or writers. List of poets Apocalypse poets Georgian poets List of romantic poets List of surrealist poets Symbolist Poets List of Albanian language poets List of Arabic language, philosopherA philosopher is a person devoted to studying and producing results in philosophy. The word, "philosopher," literally means "lover of wisdom. Popular Western philosophers in (approximate) historical order Not listed above: (some of) The Presocratics Epicu, essayistAn essayist is an author who writes compositions which can be about any particular subject. The essay is (usually) shorter and (mostly) more tentative than a formal finished monograph or treatise. The essay was a favourite form of the man of letters, allo, playwrightA playwright is an author of plays for performance in the theater. The earliest playwrights with surviving works are a group of playwrights from Greece during the 5th century BC, notably Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, and Aristophanes. The term dramatis and, some say, an efficient and tireless self-publicist. She took the - for a Duchess - unprecedented step of publishing her work under her own name which infringed the then prevailing ideas of propriety. Samuel PepysSamuel Pepys ( February 23, 1633 May 26, 1703) was a 17th century English civil servant, famous for his diary. His surname was then pronounced "Peeps", although some modern relatives with the name pronounce theirs "Pep-iss". The diary is a fascinating com called her "mad, conceited and ridiculous". Among her works is New Blazing World which could be described as the first science fictionScience fiction generally speaking, is a form of speculative fiction which deals principally with the impact of imagined science and/or technology upon society or individuals. There are, perhaps, exceptions to (or at least, some very unusual examples of) novel. Whatever the quality of her work, she was the only woman in contemporary England to have published more than one book.
As a philosopher, Margaret Cavendish rejected the Aristotelianism of the 17th century, with its picture of nature as a great machine, and the views of Thomas Hobbes, Descartes, Boyle and members of the Royal Society of London.
With the advent of the Women's Movement, Margaret Cavendish has become a role model for today's women. There is a Margaret Cavendish Society at the University of Dundee.
Some of her works:
Several of these works and many lesser-known writings are available from the Women Writers Project.