3.0
A World of Women
ByPublisher Description
When 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.
Imagine 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 A World of Women offers twenty-first century readers a new look at a neglected classic.
Beresford 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.
Imagine 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 A World of Women offers twenty-first century readers a new look at a neglected classic.
Beresford 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.
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Meet readers like you in the Fable For You feed, designed to build bookish communitiesA World of Women Reviews
3.0
ParallelLimes
Created 11 days agoShare
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Rochy Reads
Created 28 days agoShare
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“The dialect in this book was really hard to grasp — understandable, since it was written over a hundred years ago. It begins with the onset of a plague eerily similar to COVID, which is unsettling considering it was written more than two centuries ago. It’s meant to be a science-fiction novel, but I struggled to see much “science” in it.
In essence, a plague sweeps the world, mainly targeting men. With no men left, the story explores how different women — some resourceful, others less so — manage to survive (or not).
I can’t say I enjoyed this book. The middle section is a bit more engaging, focusing more on characters, but the beginning — which deals with the early stages of the plague — feels slow. There’s little longevity in the chapters or characters, making it hard to fully invest. The dialect doesn’t help, and overall it ended up feeling like a lot of “nothing.” The final part… well, I won’t spoil it, but it didn’t redeem the experience for me.
A disappointing read overall, but there were small pockets of interest — enough to earn it 2 stars instead of 1.”
Soph
Created 3 months agoShare
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Tasha
Created 6 months agoShare
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KuntyLou
Created over 1 year agoShare
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“Clearly written by a man, over a century ago… there’s nothing more to say.”
About J. D. Beresford
J.D. Beresford (1873–1947) was an English dramatist, journalist, and author. His proto-science fiction novels include The Hampdenshire Wonder (1911), A World of Women (1913), and The Riddle of the Tower (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.
Astra Taylor is director of the philosophical documentaries Zizek! (2005), Examined Life (2008), and What Is Democracy? (2018). She is author of the American Book Award winner The People’s Platform (2014) and Democracy May Not Exist, But We’ll Miss It When It’s Gone (2019), and coauthor of Can’t Pay, Won’t Pay: The Case for Economic Disobedience and Debt Abolition (2020). Her latest book is Remake the World: Essays, Reflections, Rebellions (2021).
Astra Taylor is director of the philosophical documentaries Zizek! (2005), Examined Life (2008), and What Is Democracy? (2018). She is author of the American Book Award winner The People’s Platform (2014) and Democracy May Not Exist, But We’ll Miss It When It’s Gone (2019), and coauthor of Can’t Pay, Won’t Pay: The Case for Economic Disobedience and Debt Abolition (2020). Her latest book is Remake the World: Essays, Reflections, Rebellions (2021).
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