Margaret Cavendish

Sunday, March 24, 2024

What Is It

Margaret Cavendish was a writer of poetry, philosophy, polemics, histories, plays, and utopian fiction. She employed many different genres as a way to overcome access barriers for women and build an audience for her subversive philosophical ideas. So, what was so radical about Cavendish's views? Why did she think all matter, even rocks, was at least partially rational? And how did she anticipate the term "epistemic injustice" 400 years before it was coined? Josh and Ray explore the life and thought of Margaret Cavendish with Karen Detlefsen from the University of Pennsylvania, co-editor of The Routledge Handbook of Women and Early Modern European Philosophy.

Part of our series Wise Women, generously supported by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Transcript

Transcript

Josh Landy  
Coming up on Philosophy Talk...

Margaret Cavendish  
To all noble and worthy ladies.

Josh Landy  
The life and thought of Margaret Cavendish.