Reviews
Letters Written During a Short Residence in Sweden, Norway and Denmark by Mary Wollstonecraft
alexsiddall's review against another edition
4.0
Wollstonecraft's thinking was so far ahead of her time in many ways. this is fascinating on several levels. She gives a view of Scandinavia during the late 18th century, commenting on housing, transport, diet, childraising, social mores, industry, and many other things. She's very interesting on ethics in business and government, on social class and hypocrisy, and on education. Her ideas on social equality, crime and punishment, and population are decades ahead of her time, and in many ways ahead of much thinking even today.
I wonder if Patrick O'Brian read this - I think not. She mentions how Danish traders took advantage of neutrality by getting their unsaleable goods shipped and captured by the Royal Navy, so they could claim the cargo value back from the British government. This surely would have come up in one of the Aubrey-Maturin books if it had been known to O'Brian (or have I missed it?)!
I wonder if Patrick O'Brian read this - I think not. She mentions how Danish traders took advantage of neutrality by getting their unsaleable goods shipped and captured by the Royal Navy, so they could claim the cargo value back from the British government. This surely would have come up in one of the Aubrey-Maturin books if it had been known to O'Brian (or have I missed it?)!
lizardgoats's review against another edition
2.0
Only reading the first half, Mary Wollstonecraft's A Short Residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark.
catherinedsharp's review against another edition
adventurous
informative
reflective
medium-paced
3.75
DISCLAIMER - I read this text as a set text for university meaning I did not pick this up for myself. It does not necessarily fit my usual reading selection so my review may be rather biased.
An interesting text that is both poetic and informative. The writing style describes beautiful places and moments in history as well as a personal story of travel and the feelings that go hand in hand with it.
I enjoyed the authors analysis of the cultures as well her more personal comments, that all surmounted in an interesting text that I wouldn’t have picked up myself. I’m unlikely to read again as it isn’t necessarily the kind of text you would read again but it was enjoyable.
An interesting text that is both poetic and informative. The writing style describes beautiful places and moments in history as well as a personal story of travel and the feelings that go hand in hand with it.
I enjoyed the authors analysis of the cultures as well her more personal comments, that all surmounted in an interesting text that I wouldn’t have picked up myself. I’m unlikely to read again as it isn’t necessarily the kind of text you would read again but it was enjoyable.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Classism
Minor: Suicide attempt
vannau's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
informative
reflective
relaxing
sad
slow-paced
4.0
flappermyrtle's review against another edition
3.0
I have read The Vindication for the Rights of Woman several times, and though as a modern feminist I cannot agree with all Wollstonecraft says, I always feel very strongly when reading it, and am convinced of Wollstonecraft's daring, intelligence and strength. Reading this collection of letters was, therefore, something of a disappointment.
As I described it to a friend, Mary Wollstonecraft suddenly turns out to be a sort of proto-Lady Catherine de Bourgh, commenting on everything, giving her opinion on everything (sometimes informed, sometimes not so much), and most of all strongly criticising all those around her. She still displays her intelligence when it comes to political matters and general reflections on matters of state both in the countries she visits and in England. These musings are interpolated with musings of the romantic kind, writing about the many majestic sights of Scandinavia, explaining what effects these have on her personally, praising the sublimity of the landscapes. What makes her a somewhat annoying narrator are the constant comments on the inhabitatns of Scandinivia, constantly comparing them to other Europeans and, of course, unfavourably setting them off against the English. She is positively unkind concerning these people, who host her and wish to show her their country, which is very disappointing.
Letters was Wollstonecraft's most popular text during her lifetime, and it certainly has interesting moments, nuggets of information that are exhilarating or thought-provoking. It does a fairly good job, I imagine, of sketching the political situation in the different countries and cleverly links certain outlandish practises to English customs, forcing the reader to re-evaluate their own opinions. It is a pity Wollstonecraft barely ever stops to do exactly that herself.
As I described it to a friend, Mary Wollstonecraft suddenly turns out to be a sort of proto-Lady Catherine de Bourgh, commenting on everything, giving her opinion on everything (sometimes informed, sometimes not so much), and most of all strongly criticising all those around her. She still displays her intelligence when it comes to political matters and general reflections on matters of state both in the countries she visits and in England. These musings are interpolated with musings of the romantic kind, writing about the many majestic sights of Scandinavia, explaining what effects these have on her personally, praising the sublimity of the landscapes. What makes her a somewhat annoying narrator are the constant comments on the inhabitatns of Scandinivia, constantly comparing them to other Europeans and, of course, unfavourably setting them off against the English. She is positively unkind concerning these people, who host her and wish to show her their country, which is very disappointing.
Letters was Wollstonecraft's most popular text during her lifetime, and it certainly has interesting moments, nuggets of information that are exhilarating or thought-provoking. It does a fairly good job, I imagine, of sketching the political situation in the different countries and cleverly links certain outlandish practises to English customs, forcing the reader to re-evaluate their own opinions. It is a pity Wollstonecraft barely ever stops to do exactly that herself.
dexterw's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
hopeful
informative
reflective
sad
slow-paced
2.75
grubstlodger's review against another edition
4.0
In 1796, Mary Wollstonecraft went to Norway to transact business for Gilbert Imlay, common-law husband and father of her daughter, who she took with her. The relationship was already in terminal decline and the week before she left on her journey she’d already tried to commit suicide with Laudanum. Already the author of Vindication of the Rights of Men and Vindication of the Rights of Women and a novel, so she decided to make a little money with a travel book.
…And it’s a wonderful example of the genre. Wollstonecraft has an ability to describe the sublime and the beautiful in a way that evokes memories of similar feelings I’ve had and, what is more amazing, doesn’t bore the shit of of me. How many travelogues and novels have tried to describe dramatic landscapes and raise my flagging sensibilities but succeeded in putting me to sleep? As well as all this, the descriptions are mixed with interesting readings of social and political life and some genuinely interesting reveries. The book shows a keen mind married to depth of feeling with the ability to actually craft meaningful prose out of it.
I warmed to the book on the first page, where she is in a boat in peril off the Swedish coast and remarks that in England, there’d be a rash of lifeboats out to save them, though this isn’t due to any special English benevolence but because they’d be paid per rescue.
The journey itself involved travelling into Sweden, where her two year old daughter, Fanny and her nurse were left behind while she went into Norway to set about the legal wrangling she’s been sent to sort out. Coming back, she then meets up with her baby, travels through Denmark and into Germany where she took a boat back to England from Hamburg.
Sweden she finds a worn down, with lots of people merely existing, an impression that strengthens after she returns from Norway, which she finds to be more independent. Worse that Sweden is Denmark, especially Copenhagen, which had burnt down months before and was not looking its best but, for Wollstonecraft, the worst place she visits is Hamburg. It’s a town where the nouveaux riche and the fallen French aristos mix, though that’s not the problem, it’s the money-grabbing narrow-mindedness of the place. I found it funny read of Wollstonecraft talking about the Scandinavian countries as places on their way out of barbarism as they’re now ofte considered as models of statehood.
She mixes with people, very few of which she can properly communicate with and spends as much time as she can outside by herself, admiring a field “enamelled with the sweetest wild flowers” and a great many impressive rocks. She finds it hard to be social, not only can she speak none of the languages, she doesn’t enjoy the forms of entertainment her hosts have for her, eating very large dinners in stuffy, closed rooms accompanied by lots of booze and smoking. She also takes up rowing, which gives her plenty of fresh air and time to think, “my train of thinking kept time, as it were, with the oars.”
Many of her thoughts are about, “my favourite subject of contemplation, the future improvement of the world.” She has a really interesting view of progress, in general it was extremely positive, convinced that ‘civilisation is a blessing.’ She even says that “The increasing population of the earth must necessarily tend to its improvement, as the means of existence are multiplied by improvements.” She sees this is particularly true in the case of women, where she sees greater cultural and social capital having a trickle-down effect and raising the possibilities for women above mere domestic drudges.
She’s also worried about progress, she lambasts the avariciousness of early capitalism and the way it can narrow minds to anything but money. At one point she worries about the future when humans have used up all resources and even moved into the wildernesses of Norway. She admits it’s a silly thing to worry about that may not come to pass for thousands of years, something which was very uncomfortable to this reader two-hundred and twenty years later living in a time where her fear could take place in the next eighty years.
As she says, “common minds rarely break through general rules,” and Mary Wollstonecraft clearly has no common mind. She dismisses the notion of national characteristics, especially the notion of them being formed by weather or landscape but shaped by social systems. She also sees this simplification of complex systems to be an easy cop-out for writers who should do better.
“The most essential service, I presume that authors could render to society, would be to promote enquiry and discussion, instead of making those dogmatical assertions which only appear calculated to gird the human mind round with imaginary circles.”
Of course, one of her big interests is the life of women in the countries she visits, apologising for, “still harping on the same subject you will exclaim- How can I avoid it when most of the struggles of my eventful life have been occasioned by the oppressed state of my sex.”
One of the other interesting little ideas is one she has about how “the preservation of the species, not the individual, that is the design of the Deity,” - a very interesting notion that points to Darwin.
The thing that makes the book really spark, is the sense of vulnerability. There are many luminous, numinous moments in the book but there’s always a sense that they’re moments of joy that bring light in a bedrock of distress. She’s so aware of her own passions, declaring that she “must love and admire with warmth, or I sink into sadness,” and that she has to “catch pleasure pleasure on the wing - I may be melancholy tomorrow.” This is an author who’d tried to kill herself mere weeks before writing the book, and would try again shortly after.
“How frequently has melancholy and even misanthropy taken possession of me, when the world has disgusted me, and friends have proved unkind. O have then considered myself as a particle broken off from the grand mass of mankind; - I was alone, till some involuntary sympathetic emotion, like the attraction of adhesion, made me feel that I was still a part of a mighty whole, from which I could not sever myself.”
The Oxford World’s Classics edition of this book also has excerpts of the genuine letters she wrote to Gilbert Imlay as the trip progressed. From these letters it’s clear that the journey was much harder and Wollstonecraft’s emotional pain much stronger than the published book shows. It’s clear that Imlay is not answering letters and if he is, he’s replying in simple business terms. She spends many of these letters describing her pain and demanding that Imlay either properly commits to her and his daughter, or makes a certain decision to leave them which he doesn’t seem to do. She goes through the pain of breakup, sometimes excusing Imlay,
“my imagination is perpetually shading your defects,” and other times relishing his being out of her life as, “this heart is worthy of the bliss its feelings anticipate.” Those real letters are a difficult read, showing genuine pain that does enter into the published work but in a way that elevates that book beyond ordinary travelogue.
The title may not suggest much but the book is certainly worth a read.
…And it’s a wonderful example of the genre. Wollstonecraft has an ability to describe the sublime and the beautiful in a way that evokes memories of similar feelings I’ve had and, what is more amazing, doesn’t bore the shit of of me. How many travelogues and novels have tried to describe dramatic landscapes and raise my flagging sensibilities but succeeded in putting me to sleep? As well as all this, the descriptions are mixed with interesting readings of social and political life and some genuinely interesting reveries. The book shows a keen mind married to depth of feeling with the ability to actually craft meaningful prose out of it.
I warmed to the book on the first page, where she is in a boat in peril off the Swedish coast and remarks that in England, there’d be a rash of lifeboats out to save them, though this isn’t due to any special English benevolence but because they’d be paid per rescue.
The journey itself involved travelling into Sweden, where her two year old daughter, Fanny and her nurse were left behind while she went into Norway to set about the legal wrangling she’s been sent to sort out. Coming back, she then meets up with her baby, travels through Denmark and into Germany where she took a boat back to England from Hamburg.
Sweden she finds a worn down, with lots of people merely existing, an impression that strengthens after she returns from Norway, which she finds to be more independent. Worse that Sweden is Denmark, especially Copenhagen, which had burnt down months before and was not looking its best but, for Wollstonecraft, the worst place she visits is Hamburg. It’s a town where the nouveaux riche and the fallen French aristos mix, though that’s not the problem, it’s the money-grabbing narrow-mindedness of the place. I found it funny read of Wollstonecraft talking about the Scandinavian countries as places on their way out of barbarism as they’re now ofte considered as models of statehood.
She mixes with people, very few of which she can properly communicate with and spends as much time as she can outside by herself, admiring a field “enamelled with the sweetest wild flowers” and a great many impressive rocks. She finds it hard to be social, not only can she speak none of the languages, she doesn’t enjoy the forms of entertainment her hosts have for her, eating very large dinners in stuffy, closed rooms accompanied by lots of booze and smoking. She also takes up rowing, which gives her plenty of fresh air and time to think, “my train of thinking kept time, as it were, with the oars.”
Many of her thoughts are about, “my favourite subject of contemplation, the future improvement of the world.” She has a really interesting view of progress, in general it was extremely positive, convinced that ‘civilisation is a blessing.’ She even says that “The increasing population of the earth must necessarily tend to its improvement, as the means of existence are multiplied by improvements.” She sees this is particularly true in the case of women, where she sees greater cultural and social capital having a trickle-down effect and raising the possibilities for women above mere domestic drudges.
She’s also worried about progress, she lambasts the avariciousness of early capitalism and the way it can narrow minds to anything but money. At one point she worries about the future when humans have used up all resources and even moved into the wildernesses of Norway. She admits it’s a silly thing to worry about that may not come to pass for thousands of years, something which was very uncomfortable to this reader two-hundred and twenty years later living in a time where her fear could take place in the next eighty years.
As she says, “common minds rarely break through general rules,” and Mary Wollstonecraft clearly has no common mind. She dismisses the notion of national characteristics, especially the notion of them being formed by weather or landscape but shaped by social systems. She also sees this simplification of complex systems to be an easy cop-out for writers who should do better.
“The most essential service, I presume that authors could render to society, would be to promote enquiry and discussion, instead of making those dogmatical assertions which only appear calculated to gird the human mind round with imaginary circles.”
Of course, one of her big interests is the life of women in the countries she visits, apologising for, “still harping on the same subject you will exclaim- How can I avoid it when most of the struggles of my eventful life have been occasioned by the oppressed state of my sex.”
One of the other interesting little ideas is one she has about how “the preservation of the species, not the individual, that is the design of the Deity,” - a very interesting notion that points to Darwin.
The thing that makes the book really spark, is the sense of vulnerability. There are many luminous, numinous moments in the book but there’s always a sense that they’re moments of joy that bring light in a bedrock of distress. She’s so aware of her own passions, declaring that she “must love and admire with warmth, or I sink into sadness,” and that she has to “catch pleasure pleasure on the wing - I may be melancholy tomorrow.” This is an author who’d tried to kill herself mere weeks before writing the book, and would try again shortly after.
“How frequently has melancholy and even misanthropy taken possession of me, when the world has disgusted me, and friends have proved unkind. O have then considered myself as a particle broken off from the grand mass of mankind; - I was alone, till some involuntary sympathetic emotion, like the attraction of adhesion, made me feel that I was still a part of a mighty whole, from which I could not sever myself.”
The Oxford World’s Classics edition of this book also has excerpts of the genuine letters she wrote to Gilbert Imlay as the trip progressed. From these letters it’s clear that the journey was much harder and Wollstonecraft’s emotional pain much stronger than the published book shows. It’s clear that Imlay is not answering letters and if he is, he’s replying in simple business terms. She spends many of these letters describing her pain and demanding that Imlay either properly commits to her and his daughter, or makes a certain decision to leave them which he doesn’t seem to do. She goes through the pain of breakup, sometimes excusing Imlay,
“my imagination is perpetually shading your defects,” and other times relishing his being out of her life as, “this heart is worthy of the bliss its feelings anticipate.” Those real letters are a difficult read, showing genuine pain that does enter into the published work but in a way that elevates that book beyond ordinary travelogue.
The title may not suggest much but the book is certainly worth a read.