Remarkable Lives from History

Great Irish Wives shines a spotlight on ten wives who were instrumental in their famous husbands' success: Matilda Tone, Mary O’Connell, Constance Wilde, Charlotte Shaw, Emily Shackleton, Annette Carson, Sinéad de Valera, Margaret Clarke, George Yeats and Beatrice Behan.

WINNER History Book of the Year, An Post Irish Book Awards.

Throughout history, the stories of women’s lives and work have been overshadowed by those of men.
Wives, especially, disappear, unacknowledged as patrons and champions of their husband’s work, as collaborators, muses, carers and managers of the family domain.

Great Irish Wives shines a spotlight on ten such wives: Matilda Tone, Mary O’Connell, Constance Wilde, Charlotte Shaw, Emily Shackleton, Annette Carson, Sinéad de Valera, Margaret Clarke, George Yeats and Beatrice Behan.

The men in this book are household names, from Wolfe Tone and Daniel O’Connell to Oscar Wilde and Brendan
Behan, and they all have one thing in common: they married women who enabled them to pursue their dreams,
even if that meant courting death or outrage. Nicola Pierce tells the stories of these truly remarkable women.