Benefit Street, Brighton.

I have a somewhat proprietary view of Early Modern women. This stems from the turn of the century -  when there were only four other people in Australia who had discovered Margaret Cavendish; everyone still got marks for citing Ben Johnson as the writer of the first 'Country House'  poem; Jonathan Swift was credited with having introduced the fiction & satire genres; and reference books assured us that it was the dawn of the 20thC before any woman was invited to the Royal Society. So while I'm pleased that we've challenged history and found so much more truth in it than other generations have been able to; it still saddens me that so little of this information has seeped through as mainstream knowledge. Take, for an example, the mysterious, much speculated-about Amelia Lanyer - who was named before spelling became uniform; so I'm sticking with the first spelling of it I came across back in 2004. There are many academics whose only real interest in Amelia (am on ...

  At this time of year, I like to make my vol au vents. For, the fire never be allowed to damp down completely in my oven (which be the time for to make meringues in summer); in winter 'tis a thrifty way to let it burn a little higher for to cook pie & pastry cases - and to let us gather cosily before it to do our mending, or crafting, or story-telling. 'Tis also the time the Ladies Maids spend hours cleaning & pressing the endless mud & manure from hems of cloaks & and gowns & stocking soles. While the Bootboy, with a dull knife, hacks clods of chalk, and mud & excrement from boots and patterns alike, before ever he can polish them. It hath oft caused me to grin that what the Gentry eat and when is predicated by their Cooks & not by 'Tradition' - inasmuch as 'twere Cooks who forged the tradition! Now I know scores of receipts - not solely for meat and fowl and fish; but for possets and medicinals and ungents; and to clear fleas from a be...