{"product_id":"a-world-of-women-isbn-9780262543354","title":"A World of Women","description":"\u003cb\u003eWhen a plague wipes out most of the world’s male population and civilization crumbles, women struggle to build an agrarian community in the English countryside.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eImagine a plague that brings society to a standstill by killing off most of the men on Earth. The  few men who survive descend into lechery and atavism. Meanwhile, a group of women (accompanied by one virtuous male survivor) leave the wreckage of London to start fresh, establishing a communally run agrarian outpost. But their sexist society hasn’t permitted most of them to learn any useful skills—will the commune survive their first winter? This is the bleak world imagined in 1913 by English writer J. D. Beresford—one that has particular resonance for the planet’s residents in the 2020s. This edition of \u003ci\u003eA World of Women\u003c\/i\u003e offers twenty-first century readers a new look at a neglected classic.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eBeresford introduces us to the solidly bourgeois, prim and proper Gosling family. As once-bustling London shuts down—Parliament closes, factories grind to a halt, nature reclaims stone and steel—the paterfamilias Mr. Gosling adopts a life of libertinism while his daughters in the countryside struggle to achieve a radically transformed and improved egalitarian and feminist future.\u003cbr\u003e Series Foreword vii\u003cbr\u003eIntroduction: Out of the Wreckage xiii\u003cbr\u003eAstra Taylor\u003cbr\u003eBook I The New Plague 1\u003cbr\u003e1 The Gosling Family 3\u003cbr\u003e2 The Opinions of Jasper Thrale 19\u003cbr\u003e3 London's Incredulity 39\u003cbr\u003e4 Mr Barker's Flair 45\u003cbr\u003e5 The Closed Door 53\u003cbr\u003e6 Disaster 65\u003cbr\u003e7 Panic 79\u003cbr\u003e8 Gurney in Cornwall 91\u003cbr\u003e9 The Devolution of George Gosling 99\u003cbr\u003e10 Exodus 121\u003cbr\u003eBook II The March of the Goslings 127\u003cbr\u003e11 The Silent City 129\u003cbr\u003e12 Emigrant 149\u003cbr\u003e13 Differences 169\u003cbr\u003e14 Aunt May 183\u003cbr\u003e15 From Sudbury to Wycombe 193\u003cbr\u003e16 The Young Butcher of High Wycombe 209\u003cbr\u003eBook III Womankind in the Making 223\u003cbr\u003e17 London to Marlow 225\u003cbr\u003e18 Modes of Expression 245\u003cbr\u003e19 On the Flood 277\u003cbr\u003e20 The Terrors of Spring 291\u003cbr\u003e21 Smoke 299\u003cbr\u003eEpilogue: The Great Plan 309\"Remarkably progressive”—James Lovegrove, \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe Financial Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e“\u003ci\u003eA World of Women\u003c\/i\u003e speaks as urgently to the world today as to that of 100 years ago in its insistence that crisis must also be recognized as opportunity—to change our society, not to restore it.”\u003cbr\u003e—\u003cb\u003eSherryl Vint, Professor and Chair, Department of English, University of California, Riverside\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A satire on the lives women lead nowadays and the appalling vanity of modern civilization.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe Publisher’s Weekly (1913)\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e “There is considerable food for thought in the problems which arise when man disappears and woman becomes sole possessor.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe Publisher’s Weekly (1913)\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e“Grimly humorous and tragic turn by turn.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe Nation (1913)\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e“It is a piece of the most vivid imaginative realism, as well as a challenge to our vaunted civilization.” \u003cb\u003eThe Living Age (1916)\u003c\/b\u003eJ.D. Beresford (1873–1947) was an English dramatist, journalist, and author. His proto-science fiction novels include \u003ci\u003eThe Hampdenshire Wonder\u003c\/i\u003e (1911), \u003ci\u003eA World of Women\u003c\/i\u003e (1913), and \u003ci\u003eThe Riddle of the Tower\u003c\/i\u003e (1944, with Esme Wynne-Tyson); he also wrote in the horror and ghost story genres. A great admirer of H.G. Wells, he wrote the first critical study of Wells in 1915. His daughter, Elisabeth Beresford (1926–2010), was creator of the literary and TV franchise The Wombles.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eAstra Taylor is director of the philosophical documentaries \u003ci\u003eZizek!\u003c\/i\u003e (2005), \u003ci\u003eExamined Life\u003c\/i\u003e (2008), and \u003ci\u003eWhat Is Democracy?\u003c\/i\u003e (2018). She is author of the American Book Award winner \u003ci\u003eThe People’s Platform \u003c\/i\u003e(2014) and \u003ci\u003eDemocracy May Not Exist, But We’ll Miss It When It’s Gone\u003c\/i\u003e (2019), and coauthor of \u003ci\u003eCan’t Pay, Won’t Pay: The Case for Economic Disobedience and Debt Abolition\u003c\/i\u003e (2020). Her latest book is \u003ci\u003eRemake the World: Essays, Reflections, Rebellions\u003c\/i\u003e (2021).","brand":"The MIT Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46305132937445,"sku":"NP9780262543354","price":19.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780262543354.jpg?v=1767720934","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/a-world-of-women-isbn-9780262543354","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}