William Godwin wrote this memoir of his wife Mary Wollstonecraft in 1798, just months after her death following the birth of their daughter — the future Mary Shelley. With radical honesty for its time, Godwin disclosed Wollstonecraft’s illegitimate child, her love affairs, and her suicide attempts, intending to honour her memory by telling the full truth of a remarkable life.
The author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792) was one of history’s first feminist philosophers, and Godwin’s memoir remains an essential biographical document. Download this free EPUB to read the intimate portrait written by the man who knew her best.