A World of Women by J.D. Beresford

(MIT, 2022)

Reviewed by Dan Hartland

There is something odd about reading this new edition of J.D. Beresford’s 1913 novel, A World of Women (originally published in Great Britain as Goslings). In it, a zoonotic virus travels the world from an apparent source in China, is met at first with denial and then incredulity, wrecks economies in the process, until finally techno futurists announce its potency is waning and the survivors look queasily towards an uncertain future. This is an experience described in Astra Taylor’s introduction to this MIT Press volume: she has read the novel twice, once while sheltering-in-place during Hurricane Sandy and once during the lockdowns of the COVID-19 era. This shapes her experience of the novel.

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Review from BSFA Review 17 - Download your copy here.