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    A House Full of Females: Plural Marriage and Women's Rights in Early Mormonism, 1835-1870
    A House Full of Females: Plural Marriage and Women's Rights in Early Mormonism, 1835-1870
    A House Full of Females: Plural Marriage and Women's Rights in Early Mormonism, 1835-1870
    Audiobook19 hours

    A House Full of Females: Plural Marriage and Women's Rights in Early Mormonism, 1835-1870

    Written by Laurel Thatcher Ulrich

    Narrated by Susan Ericksen

    4/5

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    About this audiobook

    A stunning and sure-to-be controversial book that pieces together, through more than two dozen nineteenth-century diaries, letters, albums, minute-books, and quilts left by first-generation Latter-day Saints, or Mormons, the never-before-told story of the earliest days of the women of Mormon "plural marriage," whose right to vote in the state of Utah was given to them by a Mormon-dominated legislature as an outgrowth of polygamy in 1870, fifty years ahead of the vote nationally ratified by Congress, and who became political actors in spite of, or because of, their marital arrangements. Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, writing of this small group of Mormon women who've previously been seen as mere names and dates, has brilliantly reconstructed these textured, complex lives to give us a fulsome portrait of who these women were and of their "sex radicalism"-the idea that a woman should choose when and with whom to bear children.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHighbridge Company
    Release dateJan 10, 2017
    ISBN9781681684581
    A House Full of Females: Plural Marriage and Women's Rights in Early Mormonism, 1835-1870

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    Reviews for A House Full of Females

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    • 5/5
      This is a spellbinding account of the women that participated in the early growth and dissemination of the LDS Church. The trials and obstacles they faced were overwhelming. Their grit and determination were more than equal to the task.
      Laural Thatcher Ulrich has honed her skills over years of recounting the great lives of ordinary people. I took pleasure in seeing a closeup view of the faith of my childhood.

      2 people found this helpful

    • 4/5
      An excellent book about women's contribution to and experience in the early Mormon religion.
    • 5/5
      I always love reading history, but I haven't really delved into much of Mormon history because most of the time I'm too busy reading YA or WWII books. As I read this book, I fell in love with all the messiness of my faith. I felt comforted by the history that women and Mormonism have always had complicated feelings--what I've been feeling the past 15 years isn't anything new. I felt inspired by what the women of the 19th century did...truly awestruck, if I'm being honest. I don't know that I would've made the same choices. This book made me realize that despite not fitting the "Mormon mold," I still belong, politics and marital status included. I just loved this book.
    • 4/5
      Normally I would not pick up a nonfiction work with this title. I have little interest in Mormonism, but I love [[Laurel Thatcher Ulrich]]'s work and I gravitate towards books about women so I thought I'd give it a try. Ulrich sticks to her normal brand of scholarship, using diaries, meeting minutes, letters, and textiles to explore the lives of the first generation of Mormon women. These women joined a religious movement and after a full commitment, leaving families and communities behind, later experience their leader's revelation about plural marriage. Some accepted it seemingly willingly, some rejected it, and some agreed to it admitting fear and sadness. Ulrich explores plural marriage - noting the economic benefits and drawbacks, the marriage of very young girls, the setting aside of older wives, the ability for men to have many, many children (a key tenet of the Mormon philosophy), and the confusion over who was "sealed" for eternity vs. who had a temporal marriage. She explores all this through the women's own writings but she draws few conclusions which sort of disappointed me. In the end I was still pretty confused about what the average Mormon woman experienced with plural marriage. Another aspect she explores is Mormon women's political role. This was more impressive to me. Though they weren't considered true leaders within the church, they ran active Relief Societies that did give them a voice. These women ended up with full voting rights in Utah well before the rest of the nation received those rights. There were even women on the committee that drew up the territorial/state constitution. I believe Mormon male leaders agreed to their contributions in order to show that plural marriage was accepted by the women in their community. While insisting on their right to vote, women also voted to uphold the right to polygamy. In the end, I was left with a good sense of what life was like for these women, which I think was the point. What I didn't get was any sort of explanation that attempted to justify plural marriage, which left me feeling sort of unimpressed with these women even considering their adventurous and political lives. It was hard to let go of my skepticism about plural marriage being a way for men to have all of their desires met while being sanctioned by the church. In the end, I still see it that way, though I guess I understand why so many women accepted it.
    • 3/5
      Impeccably researched, but at its core, it's basically apologetics.