SOURCE: "The Ragged Rout of Self: Margaret Cavendish's True Relation and the Heroics of Self-Disclosure," in A Poetics of Women's Autobiography: Marginality and the Fictions of Self-Representation, Indiana University Press, 1987, pp. 84-101.

In the following essay, Smith traces Cavendish's conflicting depictions of herself in her autobiography to the tension between the traditional ideal of feminine silence and Cavendish's desire to give voice to her own life-story.

When the rumour spread that the crazy Duchess was coming up from Welbeck to pay her respects at Court, people crowded the streets to look at her, and the curiosity of Mr. Pepys twice brought him to wait in the Park to see her pass. But the pressure of the crowd about her coach was too great. He could only catch a glimpse of her in her silver coach with her footmen all in velvet, a velvet cap on her head, and...