A ‘Reading for Wellbeing’ recommended read!
Remarkable creatures by Tracy Chevalier
This is the fictional account of the life of Mary Anning, a British fossil collector, dealer, and palaeontologist in the early 19th century.
It is an inspiring story of a young woman from a working class background who flies in the face of social conventions and goes on to make discoveries which contribute to fundamental changes in scientific thinking about prehistoric life and the history of the Earth (a subject dominated by men at the time).
Similarly the other main character Elizabeth Philpot, from a middle class background, also defies social conventions and devotes most of her time to fossil hunting, remaining a “spinster”.
This book is a reminder than women have always defied the rules imposed on them, and in this case it led to a woman making some of the most important discoveries of the time, and turning the theories of men upside down.
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