0:00:00 > 0:00:02Now it's time for Meet the Author.
0:00:09 > 0:00:10Bee Rowlatt is a writer and journalist,
0:00:10 > 0:00:12and the mother of four children.
0:00:12 > 0:00:14She has also been a fan since her student days of
0:00:14 > 0:00:16Mary Wollstonecraft, pioneering feminist, and the mother of Mary
0:00:16 > 0:00:17Shelley, author of Frankenstein.
0:00:17 > 0:00:18In Search Of Mary:
0:00:18 > 0:00:21The Mother Of All Journeys, is a sort of travel book, in
0:00:21 > 0:00:24which Bee, accompanied by her baby son Will, travels to Scandinavia
0:00:24 > 0:00:28and Paris in Wollstonecraft's footsteps, and later to California.
0:00:28 > 0:00:31It is also an exploration of what it means to be a feminist,
0:00:31 > 0:00:34Wollstonecraft's world, and the modern world.
0:00:49 > 0:00:51Bee Rowlatt, let's start with Mary Wollstonecraft.
0:00:51 > 0:00:56A lot of people, probably even today, will not know who she is.
0:00:57 > 0:01:00The very brief introduction?
0:01:00 > 0:01:02The brief introduction is that she is the foremother of feminism.
0:01:02 > 0:01:04She wrote the earliest account of women's equality,
0:01:04 > 0:01:07which was a vindication of the rights of woman, in 1792.
0:01:07 > 0:01:10What is less known about her is that she did travel writing,
0:01:10 > 0:01:13war reporting, she was a fearless and intrepid explorer of the world.
0:01:13 > 0:01:18And a great Enlightenment philosopher.
0:01:18 > 0:01:20And she also had a famous daughter?
0:01:20 > 0:01:24She had a very famous daughter who wrote Frankenstein, Mary Shelley.
0:01:24 > 0:01:27And why have you always been so fascinated with her?
0:01:27 > 0:01:29This goes back a long way, doesn't it?
0:01:29 > 0:01:31It does, we have got a lot of history together.
0:01:31 > 0:01:33It actually came about when I was an undergrad student
0:01:33 > 0:01:35looking at the Romantic poets.
0:01:35 > 0:01:37It turned out that they were very heavily influenced by this
0:01:37 > 0:01:39travel writing that she did.
0:01:39 > 0:01:41She wrote a book called Letters From Norway, a fairly
0:01:41 > 0:01:44obscure, now fairly obscure, book.
0:01:44 > 0:01:46It details a journey that she undertakes
0:01:46 > 0:01:50around the shores of Scandinavia.
0:01:50 > 0:01:51She does not reveal her true purpose.
0:01:51 > 0:01:54But the writing itself is this extraordinary combination of kind
0:01:54 > 0:01:56of very dry local detail, and then these sort of ecstatic,
0:01:56 > 0:01:57sublime yearnings.
0:01:57 > 0:02:00They are in the shape of letters, all addressed to some mystery
0:02:00 > 0:02:02person.
0:02:02 > 0:02:04And then fairly recently, in the 1970s, scholars and historians
0:02:04 > 0:02:09discovered that the actual true purpose of her writings was that she
0:02:09 > 0:02:18had been sent off on a treasure hunt by her dodgy boyfriend,
0:02:18 > 0:02:19to whom the letters are addressed.
0:02:19 > 0:02:21There is a whole load of backstory.
0:02:21 > 0:02:24She met him in Paris during the revolution when she had gone
0:02:24 > 0:02:26over there, and he had been selling revolutionary, selling aristocrats'
0:02:26 > 0:02:28silver in Scandinavia in exchange for food, possibly arms.
0:02:28 > 0:02:32One of these shipments of silver had gone missing, and he packed her off,
0:02:32 > 0:02:38with her young daughter, her baby daughter, in search of this silver.
0:02:38 > 0:02:41That was astonishing, because she was a single mum travelling
0:02:41 > 0:02:45in very difficult conditions.
0:02:45 > 0:02:48These were times, you know, 1795, these were times when most men
0:02:48 > 0:02:51would not travel on their own.
0:02:51 > 0:02:57You know, there really were highwaymen and pirates.
0:02:57 > 0:02:59And she goes off with a baby!
0:02:59 > 0:03:01And to me, that just seems so incredible,
0:03:01 > 0:03:03you know, the very vexed subject of careers versus motherhood,
0:03:03 > 0:03:06it seems to be one of those topics that doesn't ever go away.
0:03:06 > 0:03:09I just thought, how on earth did she do it?
0:03:09 > 0:03:11So, you set out to find out by doing it yourself,
0:03:11 > 0:03:12with your young son, Will?
0:03:12 > 0:03:14Yes, I hoped to do a Wollstonecraft!
0:03:14 > 0:03:16Well, this is a very entertaining book.
0:03:16 > 0:03:18Will comes across as quite a powerful character.
0:03:18 > 0:03:20How old was he when you went?
0:03:20 > 0:03:23Well, as luck would have it, when we travelled, he was
0:03:23 > 0:03:25the same age as Wollstonecraft's baby, roughly ten months old.
0:03:25 > 0:03:27Just starting to crawl, you know, not the easiest phase
0:03:28 > 0:03:34as a travelling companion.
0:03:34 > 0:03:36He is very cute, there are lots of photographs
0:03:36 > 0:03:38of the two of you in Norway.
0:03:38 > 0:03:39And it looks beautiful.
0:03:39 > 0:03:40You are by the sea.
0:03:40 > 0:03:41It is wonderful.
0:03:41 > 0:03:44But it is quite tough, isn't it, travelling by yourself with a baby?
0:03:44 > 0:03:45It is not easy.
0:03:45 > 0:03:48But part of the revelation was that actually it gives you a brilliant
0:03:48 > 0:03:49entree into people's lives.
0:03:49 > 0:03:51Because people do take you on, you know.
0:03:51 > 0:03:54We were put up in strangers' houses, everybody talked to us, you know,
0:03:54 > 0:03:56who is this weird Wollstonecraft fanatic,
0:03:56 > 0:03:57travelling around with a baby?
0:03:57 > 0:04:00You know, we were quite an oddity, in much the same way that
0:04:00 > 0:04:00Wollstonecraft was.
0:04:00 > 0:04:02She actually describes this in her writing.
0:04:02 > 0:04:05What did you learn about Wollstonecraft that you hadn't
0:04:05 > 0:04:06known before?
0:04:06 > 0:04:06How brave she was.
0:04:06 > 0:04:08It was just astonishing what she did.
0:04:08 > 0:04:11I knew for example that she suffered quite accute depression,
0:04:11 > 0:04:14and this is very apparent in the reading of the book.
0:04:14 > 0:04:16She tried to take her own life.
0:04:16 > 0:04:17She did.
0:04:17 > 0:04:19She attempted suicide twice, and, you know, these things I really
0:04:19 > 0:04:22struggled with, because basically I am a really happy person.
0:04:22 > 0:04:25So, whilst I wanted to get as close as I could,
0:04:25 > 0:04:26there were moments when I just...
0:04:26 > 0:04:29There were things that I found very hard to approach, for instance,
0:04:29 > 0:04:29her death.
0:04:29 > 0:04:33It took me a long time to be able to write about that.
0:04:33 > 0:04:36In the book, you also take a trip with Will, a little bit
0:04:36 > 0:04:38later, to Paris, to try and retrace her steps during the revolution.
0:04:38 > 0:04:41There is a wonderful photograph of Will attempting to break away up
0:04:41 > 0:04:44the stairs in Paris.
0:04:44 > 0:04:52And then you also went to California later and met some really...
0:04:52 > 0:04:55Slightly weird and wacky feminists in California.
0:04:55 > 0:04:58What were you trying to do?
0:04:58 > 0:04:59Wollstonecraft of course never went to California.
0:04:59 > 0:05:01Wollstonecraft wanted to go to America.
0:05:01 > 0:05:02For her, that was the true frontier.
0:05:02 > 0:05:04She fell in love with an American frontierman.
0:05:04 > 0:05:07As the French Revolution became increasingly bloody and violent,
0:05:07 > 0:05:12her gaze went from the blood-soaked streets of Paris to America.
0:05:12 > 0:05:16That is true of so many of the Romantics.
0:05:16 > 0:05:19So she wanted to go, sadly she didn't live long enough.
0:05:19 > 0:05:21She had plans to take her family out there.
0:05:21 > 0:05:24It seemed that in her eyes that was the revolution that worked.
0:05:24 > 0:05:28For me, I wanted to go to see where her feminist legacy, you know,
0:05:28 > 0:05:31how far you can push it, where is the logical conclusion,
0:05:31 > 0:05:33where does it go?
0:05:33 > 0:05:36The question which you pose at one point in the book is whether
0:05:36 > 0:05:41feminism and working motherhood are just middle-class occupations.
0:05:41 > 0:05:44You are essentially middle-class, you are a writer, your husband works
0:05:44 > 0:05:48for the BBC, Justin Rowlatt, the BBC's correspondent in Delhi now.
0:05:48 > 0:05:50What is your answer, from your own experience, your own
0:05:50 > 0:05:55travels, and from Wollstonecraft, what is your answer to question?
0:05:55 > 0:05:57My answer is that, you know, feminism should be
0:05:57 > 0:05:59a very big umbrella, there is space for everybody.
0:05:59 > 0:06:02It is not, whilst I completely content that, yes, some women do not
0:06:02 > 0:06:06have the option of choosing, they just have to strap a baby to their
0:06:06 > 0:06:10back and still go out and plough the fields, they don't have the luxury
0:06:10 > 0:06:12of that debate, you know, everybody's experience is valid,
0:06:12 > 0:06:17and everybody's experience is worthy of telling.
0:06:17 > 0:06:21At one point in this book you take a detour to Holbeck Leeds to meet
0:06:21 > 0:06:25a friend of yours who works there with very disadvantaged women.
0:06:25 > 0:06:29Tell me about Holbeck and its significance?
0:06:29 > 0:06:32It is a friend of mine who works in community social outreach
0:06:32 > 0:06:35in Holbeck, which is possibly one of the most
0:06:35 > 0:06:39underprivileged parts of Leeds.
0:06:39 > 0:06:42It was shocking.
0:06:42 > 0:06:45She works with people who are completely excluded and have
0:06:45 > 0:06:46children under the age of five.
0:06:46 > 0:06:49And it just blew me away, actually.
0:06:49 > 0:06:52It is...
0:06:52 > 0:06:55You know, I'm from Yorkshire, this is in our country,
0:06:55 > 0:06:57and it was poverty that I hadn't really seen before.
0:06:57 > 0:06:59It made the reading of Wollstonecraft even more
0:06:59 > 0:07:03poignant, because that is what she was all about.
0:07:03 > 0:07:05She was about the vulnerable position of women, and single
0:07:05 > 0:07:11mothers, in today's society, which increasingly seems, with austerity,
0:07:11 > 0:07:16it seems an increasingly cruel place for a struggling single mum.
0:07:16 > 0:07:19And she spoke very much about that.
0:07:19 > 0:07:21Should we know more about Wollstonecraft?
0:07:21 > 0:07:23Absolutely, we should know more about Wollstonecraft.
0:07:23 > 0:07:25I can't believe she isn't more famous.
0:07:25 > 0:07:28That was partly the motivation behind writing the book, was that I
0:07:28 > 0:07:31just couldn't believe that there is this incredible woman who did
0:07:31 > 0:07:36so much and achieved so much in so little time, she died when she was
0:07:36 > 0:07:4038, she died at the peak of her writing powers. It is heartbreaking.
0:07:40 > 0:07:42So, she isn't well enough known, and I will not be satisfied
0:07:42 > 0:07:46until she is famous everywhere!
0:07:46 > 0:07:48Bee Rowlatt, thank you very much indeed.
0:07:48 > 0:07:50Thank you.
0:08:01 > 0:08:01Good