Englishwoman in America

by Isabella L. Bird

Overview

Isabella Bird was one of the most famous and admired travel writers of the nineteenth century. The first woman to be elected to the Royal Geographical Society, she published eight volumes of travel writings which documented her lifetime of travels to every continent. Often ill as a child, at age eighteen she underwent partially successful spinal surgery to remove a tumor from her spine, yet continued to suffer from a series of ailments. Bird's doctor adviced travel as a cure, so in 1854 she was given one hundred pounds by her father and told she could travel until her money ran out. Leaving Liverpool in June, she travelled to Halifax, Nova Scotia to visit cousins. Becoming restless, Bird undertook wider travels, covering nearly 6,000 miles, visiting Maine, Ohio, Illinois, Michigan, Quebec, New York, and Massachusetts. She detailed her travels in letters to her sister which went on to become the basis for her first book, The Englishwoman in America, published in 1856. This first trip overseas, and the resultant book, set Bird up for a highly successful career as a traveller and writer.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781429003360
Publisher:	Arcadia Publishing SC
Publication date:	01/31/2007
Series:	Travel in America
Pages:	480
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

1831-1904

Table of Contents

1. Prefatory and explanatory; 2. An inhospitable reception; 3. Popular ignorance; 4. From St George's cross to the stars and stripes; 5. First experiences of American freedom; 6. A suspected bill; 7. The Queen City continued; 8. The hickory stick; 9. A vexatious incident; 10. The Place of Council; 11. 'I've seen nothing'; 12. A scene at starting; 13. The House of Commons; 14. Concluding remarks on Canada; 15. Preliminary remarks on re-entering the United States; 16. Position of New York; 17. The cemetery; 18. Origin of the constitution; 19. General remarks continued; 20. The America.