Fenwomen: A Portrait of Women in an English Village (Virago Modern Classics)

Mary Chamberlain

Sep 2025 · Hachette UK

Ebook

256

Pages

Eligible

About this ebook

50th ANNIVERSARY EDITION - now a Virago Modern Classic with a new introduction by Alexandra Harris

'Full of dignity, courage and humour, and as fresh and insightful as the day it was written, FENWOMEN is a vital portrait of rural women's lives - not only as they were lived in the 1970s in one Cambridgeshire village, but in the generations before it, all over the country, and reaching forward into today's world, too' MELISSA HARRISON

Mary Coe recalls summers spent gleaning in the fields, laudanum-soothed babies strapped to their mothers' backs. Ann Sharman, married and pregnant at seventeen, imagines another life outside the village. Eighty-six-year-old Sybil Hayhoe looks back with pride at her years in service, while the village postwoman is sharply aware of her unequal wages. Girls aspire to be housewives, hairdressers or nurses - except Fiona, who dreams of training horses.

Told through the voices of ordinary women, Mary Chamberlain's portrait of an isolated village in the Cambridgeshire Fens remains as vital and thought-provoking as on its groundbreaking publication in 1975. A feminist answer to Ronald Blythe's Akenfield, it vividly captures the rhythms, hopes and tensions of women's lives in a working-class rural community, and offers a unique snapshot of an almost-vanished England.

'Fenwomen is a fascinating insight into 20th-century rural life' The Times

'A strong and moving book' Sunday Times

'[A] masterpiece' Reviews in History

'A pioneering work of oral history' History Today

50th ANNIVERSARY EDITION - now a Virago Modern Classic with a new introduction by Alexandra Harris 'Full of dignity, courage and humour, and as fresh and insightful as the day it was written, FENWOMEN is a vital portrait of rural women's lives - not only as they were lived in the 1970s in one Ca...

About the author

Mary Chamberlain is a novelist and historian of Britain and the Caribbean. She is the author of the international best seller, The Dressmaker of Dachau, first published in 2015 by The Borough Press in 2016. It sold to 19 countries, and was a best seller in many of them. Her historical works include Fenwomen: A portrait of women in an English Village'which was the first book to be published by Virago Press in 1975, and was the basis for Caryl Churchill's award-winning play, Fen. She is emeritus professor of Caribbean history at Oxford Brookes University.

Mary Chamberlain is a novelist and historian of Britain and the Caribbean. She is the author of the international best seller, The Dressmaker of Dachau, first published in 2015 by The Borough Press in 2016. It sold to 19 countries, and was a best seller in many of them. Her historical works inclu...

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