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Grown up in an unconventional wealthy family at the end of the Napoleonic age, a married woman in the London of the Great Exhibition described by Charles Dickens and analysed by Karl Marx, a countryside mother beside a man who was “shyly” revolutionizing the natural sciences: Emma is one of the most unique witnesses of a crucial age. Her education, her lifestyle, her views about society (women rights, childhood, religion, science), her passions for literature, music and the fine arts turn Emma into a special key for a better understanding of the complexities and contradictions of the Victorian society, beyond the stereotyped paradigm of hypocrisy and moralism.

1. The Wedgwoods’ darling – A journey to Italy. Family memories. Growing up in paradise. On a journey again. Weddings and funerals. Charles’s travel.
2. An English wedding – Love in the Victorian age. Guess who’s coming to dinner. The most beautiful day. A matter of faith. Yellow curtains in Gover Street. And they lived happily ever after.
3. Children, Bible and Barnacles – The city mouse. And the country mouse. Births and deaths. The evolution in the house garden. An almost deadly delay. Another life species. Behind every great man there’s a great woman. The end of the road.
4. Portrait of a Lady – Allegro, non troppo. Like a novel. The world in an envelope. The end of an era.

Chiara Ceci, PhD, lives in Cambridge where she works at the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds. She has got a Master degree in Science Communication at the International School for Advanced Studies, Trieste. She was assistant researcher in Epistemology and Philosophy of Science at the University of Milan Bicocca; she worked as scientific coordinator of the exhibition Darwin 1809-2009 and of the editorial work Grande Opera UTET Il futuro della Terra (The future of the Planet). She has been working also as a free lance science writer and translator (S.J. Gould and E. Vrba’s papers – 1982, 1986 –  Exaptation, il bricolage dell’evoluzione, Bollati Boringhieri).