Wives of Fame: Mary Livingstone, Jenny Marx and Emma Darwin

Here are portraits of three very different Victorian women, all of whom married men of exceptional talent, energy and genius. To be the wife of such frenetic, explosive characters as David Livingstone, Karl Marx or Charles Darwin, especially at this period in history, demanded rare qualities. Yet the late twentieth-century view of these women is perhaps best summed up in the frequently heard comment: 'I didn't know he had a wife.'

The mid-nineteenth century was a time of unprecedented moveme...