Waiting room opens 17.45 for 18:00 – 19:30 (British Summer Time) Chair: Sara Read Zoom host: Trudie Messent
The first seminar of the 2022 – 2023 season takes place on Thursday 13 October 2022. Please note the earlier seminar time of 18:00 – 19:30.
This seminar will take place on Zoom. Please be aware, you must be a member of the WSG to gain access to the Zoom sessions. The links are distributed through our WSG mailing list 24 hours before the event. Becoming a member means you will be able to attend the Zoom and in-person seminars for the 2022-2023 season.
13 October Seminar papers
Yvonne Noble: Anne Finch’s Mrs Randolph.
In contract to the editors of the new Anne Finch edition, I identify her friend and fellow poet, Mrs. Randolph, as Mary Castillion Randolph, first wife of the Recorder of Canterbury. This paper surveys the poems we can identify as hers and demonstrates her place at the center of an open and admired poetic circle in a period – – the 1690s– when most women poets, like Anne Finch, tried to shield their identities in anonymity or with pastoral names. Four poems have been known by Mrs. Randolph; here I identify a fifth. Abstract by Yvonne Noble
Valeria Viola: Eighteenth-century Global Domesticity. Don Luigi and Donna Caterina Riggio, Princes of Campofiorito.
In the eighteenth century, the most disparate goods were both the reason and the outcome of a vast cross-cultural network, and people moving these goods from one place to another were the agents that enabled this network. As a diplomat of the Spanish crown, Don Luigi Riggio et Branciforte (1677 -1757), prince of Campofiorito, travelled through Europe for 35 years with his wife, Donna Caterina Gravina et Gravina (1676-1747). On their travels, the princes of Campofiorito brought with them a vast collection of assorted furnishings, expanding it with new acquisitions. In so doing, this material culture constructed their international trait and stressed their alignment with both the eclectic taste introduced by the Bourbon King of Spain and the politics underlying this taste.
The contribution focuses on the coordinated work of the two, in the cities where they lived as Spanish ambassadors, namely Venice (1737-1740), Paris (1740-1746) and Naples (1746-1750). The paper explores how the practices and behaviours of the ambassadors affected the permeability of their domestic boundaries and the creation of the social network necessary for their role. In detail, it explores the elusive figure of Donna Caterina through her will, her only surviving letter, and some memories of people who met the couple. Abstract by Valeria Viola
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Post by Trudie Messent
Women's Studies Group 1558 - 1837 