Routledge Companion to Mary Wollstonecraft: Wollstonecraft at Work
Due Date: 01-15-2025
The Routledge Companion to Mary Wollstonecraft will focus on Wollstonecraft as a writer at work, a writer consciously and deliberately innovating to produce a rich and varied oeuvre that reveals forms of intellectual and professional labor beyond her better-known philosophical treatises and novels. It will make the case for Wollstonecraft as an artist first and a polemicist second, yet an artist whose creative interventions stayed true to her principles in the face of conservative backlash.
We envision essays relating to three broad categories—Wollstonecraft at Work, Wollstonecraft in the World, and Wollstonecraft in the Classroom—and invite essays on all stages of Wollstonecraft’s career and all genres in which she worked. Possible topics might include Wollstonecraft as a working woman / professional writer; Wollstonecraft as writer, craftsperson, artist; Wollstonecraft as an innovator; Wollstonecraft’s growth and development as a writer and thinker; Wollstonecraft and visual culture; Wollstonecraft as an educator. We also seek essays that address Wollstonecraft’s historical as well as contemporary resonances in literary, artistic, and feminist political contexts across the globe. We encourage reflections on the productive imbrications of Wollstonecraft’s life and work, on her critical reception, her artistic legacies, and her place in popular culture. Finally, we invite essays on editing and teaching Wollstonecraft’s work. How is her influence felt throughout the world and how is her work taught in various regions and countries? How does she continue to educate us and our students?
We welcome proposals on these or related topics. Please send abstracts of approximately 250 words to both editors via email by 15 January 2026. For a fuller description of the volume and for preliminary inquiries, please email the editors.