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The Woman Who Gave Birth to Rabbits: Stories
Emma Donoghue, celebrated author of Slammerskin, vividly animates hidden scraps of the past in this remarkable collection. An engraving of a woman giving birth to rabbits, a plague ballad, theological pamphlets, and an articulated skeleton are ingeniously fleshed out into rollicking tales. Whether she's spinning the tale of a soldier tricked into marrying a dowdy spinster, or a Victorian surgeon's attempts to "improve" women, Donoghue fills us with the sights and smells of the period as she summons the ghosts of ordinary people, bringing them to unforgettable life in fiction.
255 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2002
About the author
Emma Donoghue
70 books12.3k followersGrew up in Ireland, 20s in England doing a PhD in eighteenth-century literature, since then in Canada. Best known for my novel, film and play ROOM, also other contemporary and historical novels and short stories, non-fiction, theatre and middle-grade novels.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 166 reviews
August 3, 2018
Emma Donoghue spent years collecting strange facts, anecdotes, stories, poems and songs from over the centuries in England. In this book she takes one of these per chapter and creates a short story around it based on the historical evidence and her own imagination.
There are some pretty wild and wacky tales as the book title attests to! At the end of each chapter she also gives the source material she used.
Donoghue is probably best known these days for writing “Room”, but most of her work is historical fiction and she clearly has an interest in odd stories from the past. This book is best for fans of historical fiction and those who don’t mind reading short stories.
There are some pretty wild and wacky tales as the book title attests to! At the end of each chapter she also gives the source material she used.
Donoghue is probably best known these days for writing “Room”, but most of her work is historical fiction and she clearly has an interest in odd stories from the past. This book is best for fans of historical fiction and those who don’t mind reading short stories.
May 25, 2017
Shoutout to my fellow virgo, Pucca, for getting me this wonderful, wonderful book.
The Woman Who Gave Birth To Rabbits is a short story collection based on various, interesting history facts from England and Ireland. From cross-dressing contesses to desperate hoaxes, this book is pouring life into fun facts that might have came into your life, bring a passing smile on your face and then disappear forever from your mind. From amusing, little reminiscenses to goose-bumping fervour, this book stands as a testament of a world that has once been. The nerd in me screamed in delight; give me history and good writing and I'm yours.
What I liked especially about this collection is that at the end of each short story, there is a note, where Emma Donoghue talks about the sources of inspiration for her story, adding recommended reads on each topic. I'm pretty sure I will check out some of those.
Overall, a very good collection, with too little weaker stories to even be mentioned and I am so glad to know about so many weird, interesting and creepy things that happened throughout history.
The Woman Who Gave Birth To Rabbits is a short story collection based on various, interesting history facts from England and Ireland. From cross-dressing contesses to desperate hoaxes, this book is pouring life into fun facts that might have came into your life, bring a passing smile on your face and then disappear forever from your mind. From amusing, little reminiscenses to goose-bumping fervour, this book stands as a testament of a world that has once been. The nerd in me screamed in delight; give me history and good writing and I'm yours.
What I liked especially about this collection is that at the end of each short story, there is a note, where Emma Donoghue talks about the sources of inspiration for her story, adding recommended reads on each topic. I'm pretty sure I will check out some of those.
Overall, a very good collection, with too little weaker stories to even be mentioned and I am so glad to know about so many weird, interesting and creepy things that happened throughout history.
June 14, 2020
My reasons for liking so many of Emma Donoghue's books are summed up quite nicely by the author herself in the introduction to this short story collection:
"I have often stumbled over a scrap of history so fascinating that I has to stop whatever I was doing to write a story about it. My sources are the last seven hundred years of British and Irish life ... So this book is what I have to show for ten years of sporadic grave-robbing, ferreting out forgotten puzzles and peculiar incidents ..."
and most importantly, using those nuggets from history to ask, "what if" and create fantastic, hard-biting, sometimes grotesque stories from those nuggets.
These stories are a trek into what feels like ancient British history, but it's a world in which the author is obviously very comfortable. They are about women, which is refreshing. Best of all, they are fascinating bits of history.
"I have often stumbled over a scrap of history so fascinating that I has to stop whatever I was doing to write a story about it. My sources are the last seven hundred years of British and Irish life ... So this book is what I have to show for ten years of sporadic grave-robbing, ferreting out forgotten puzzles and peculiar incidents ..."
and most importantly, using those nuggets from history to ask, "what if" and create fantastic, hard-biting, sometimes grotesque stories from those nuggets.
These stories are a trek into what feels like ancient British history, but it's a world in which the author is obviously very comfortable. They are about women, which is refreshing. Best of all, they are fascinating bits of history.
February 9, 2011
After reading Room, I had to go back and remind myself just how much Emma Donoghue's prose has changed direction, and this little book of medieval-inspired tales certainly couldn't be any farther from her recent "ripped from today's headlines" novel.
The title tale concerns the first in a rash of 14th century women to pretend to give birth to rabbits, mostly seeking to exhibit themselves in order to escape starvation. And in my expert opinion, you'd have to be pretty hungry to stuff a bunny up your cooter, amirite, ladies? The conceit of this little book is that each tale is inspired by a real woman in history--usually one who has received only the glancingest blow from the History Stick. Each story is wrapped up in a nice little package, with the final page telling you more about the "real" woman who inspired it.
One thing that hasn't changed from Donoghue's medieval-inspired work to "Room" is that she is an author who finds her inspiration exclusively in the world around her and in the work of others. Luckily, what she lacks in imagination and somewhat one-dimensional characterization, she makes up for in rich description and an excellent ability to choose her source material.
The title tale concerns the first in a rash of 14th century women to pretend to give birth to rabbits, mostly seeking to exhibit themselves in order to escape starvation. And in my expert opinion, you'd have to be pretty hungry to stuff a bunny up your cooter, amirite, ladies? The conceit of this little book is that each tale is inspired by a real woman in history--usually one who has received only the glancingest blow from the History Stick. Each story is wrapped up in a nice little package, with the final page telling you more about the "real" woman who inspired it.
One thing that hasn't changed from Donoghue's medieval-inspired work to "Room" is that she is an author who finds her inspiration exclusively in the world around her and in the work of others. Luckily, what she lacks in imagination and somewhat one-dimensional characterization, she makes up for in rich description and an excellent ability to choose her source material.
September 26, 2018
This short story collection had a great concept and was written by a great author but to be honest it was completely boring and forgettable. Not one story sticks out to me as worth mentioning and I couldn’t wait for it to be over.
April 11, 2021
Most of the stories in this collection are indubitably astonishing, historically accurate and filled with wonderful bits of social satire and criticism. This was a highly enjoyable read and I would recommend this book to anyone who wishes to read several slice-of-life, pioneer interpretations of some very interesting historical figures of Great Britain which perhaps did not receive the representation they deserved so far.
January 13, 2019
This is a wonderful collection of short stories which are all based on snippets the author found while doing research for other novels. There is a little bit of fact or at least folklore in each of these stories, and they are a fascinating collection of historical fiction.
August 9, 2020
I'm a fan of Emma Donoghue. She wrote Kissing the Witch, a book of female-centric fairy tale retellings that came around at just the right time for baby lesbian me (not that I figured that out for like eight more years but you know), and which I still love, after my friend Isana directed me back to it (thanks Isana!). She wrote Astray, which I loved too, and The Wonder, which I reviewed a little while ago. I got to meet her in person at this year's National Book Festival, at which I sincerely hope I wasn't too creepy-fangirl but my lord was she ever awesome.
And she also wrote The Woman Who Gave Birth to Rabbits, a book of largely female-oriented short historical fiction. Which, unsurprisingly, I love.
The stories are based off actual historical incidents, like the titular story (okay, actually called The Last Rabbit but it's about the titular woman), about Mary Toft. Come, Gentle Night is about the wedding night of John Ruskin and Euphemia Gray, which is completely accurate, very Shakespearian, and still must be read to be believed. Account is a really neat story told entirely in statistics (ie, "year in which the King rode to Drummond Castle, "number of hours the king could stay in the saddle without a rest," etc) about the poisoning of King James IV's mistress and two of her sisters. And that's only three of them: there are so many stories in this book, so many scraps of history brought to life, and they're all so good.
Now, there some fucked-up things that occur in the book, but they're fucked-up things that happened in real life. So, you know. If this sounds interesting to you, let me know and I'll put together a full list of trigger warnings, because there's a lot. But it's great, I love it, and if you like historical fiction, I highly recommend it.
And she also wrote The Woman Who Gave Birth to Rabbits, a book of largely female-oriented short historical fiction. Which, unsurprisingly, I love.
The stories are based off actual historical incidents, like the titular story (okay, actually called The Last Rabbit but it's about the titular woman), about Mary Toft. Come, Gentle Night is about the wedding night of John Ruskin and Euphemia Gray, which is completely accurate, very Shakespearian, and still must be read to be believed. Account is a really neat story told entirely in statistics (ie, "year in which the King rode to Drummond Castle, "number of hours the king could stay in the saddle without a rest," etc) about the poisoning of King James IV's mistress and two of her sisters. And that's only three of them: there are so many stories in this book, so many scraps of history brought to life, and they're all so good.
Now, there some fucked-up things that occur in the book, but they're fucked-up things that happened in real life. So, you know. If this sounds interesting to you, let me know and I'll put together a full list of trigger warnings, because there's a lot. But it's great, I love it, and if you like historical fiction, I highly recommend it.
October 31, 2016
3.5 stars. Truly fascinating premise for a collection of short stories. The execution could've been better, however. I still really enjoyed it.
Stand-outs: "The Last Rabbit"; "Cured"; "Figures of Speech"
Stand-outs: "The Last Rabbit"; "Cured"; "Figures of Speech"
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August 13, 2024nothing groundbreaking but very enjoyable!
March 1, 2021
Reader's unpleasant performance ruined it for me, but the content, while an interesting topic, wasn't presented in a very interesting way either. Just relaying the historical records became dull very fast. The author is an excellent writer, so it's an even bigger disappointment she chose not to include any contemporary analysis of the cases.
January 8, 2021
As an idea this book, using under-mentioned historical moments as inspiration for a set of short stories is a nice one, but I just found that with a couple of exceptions the stories never caught my attention, and the book felt like a chore
January 2, 2022
I liked all the short stories here at "worst," but truly, for me, the best parts were the real events/people who inspired the stories. Emma Donoghue is just...the coolest. I love seeing all these different things she's done, and I can't wait to check out more books she's written.
April 24, 2021
Loved every story and the interesting tidbits they each emerged from.
November 29, 2020
Maybe leaning to a 3.5 stars. I found these stories compelling and interesting but still didn't love it as much as I hoped. The premise sounded so good and of it would have been a longer story containing a few of these people I would have perhaps enjoyed it more. I have some difficult time to enjoy a short story collection, especially on audio. But decent read nevertheless
January 1, 2021
Some stories in this book are real bangers. The titular one, the cult one, the one toward the end with the widow scattering ashes. And a few others that escape my memory because I took my time with this book (2 years). It was the thing I kept by my bedside table to read myself back to sleep in the middle of the night. That’s not a dig. I just mean to say that it’s a slow-burn type of book. I thoroughly enjoyed the historical tidbits at the end of each chapter. Dare I say I would’ve preferred shorter stories with lengthier historical bits? I also frequently skipped to the end of each story and read the background before resuming the story so I could make heads or tails of what the hell was going on. Or find motivation to care. The story about Mary Shelley is a good example of this. I cared about the story 100% more after learning it was about her. This is admittedly a shortcoming on my part. Or is it? Who can say? Anyway, Donoghue geeks out over obscure historical stuff and I for one really respect and appreciate that. Upon further reflection I’m bumping my rating up a star. Emma, girl, you deserve it. 😘
December 2, 2009
A mixed bag of short stories based on 18-19th-c (with a smattering of other eras) british history. Since many of the stories are in the first person, one if the treats of the book is figuring out who and when before you get to the endnotes.
The stories themselves range from okay to wonderful. Stories such as "Revelations," "Words for Things," The Necessity of Burning," and "Looking for Petronilla" are well-paced page-turners. Others fell a bit flat. The most disappointing (perhaps because it had the most potential) was "Dido." It starts out as a critque of the Zoffany portrait of Mansfield's great nieces: Dido Elizabeth Belle, in this interpretation of the portrait, exists to accentuate the pale beauty of her cousin, Lady Elizabeth Murray. Yet the story soon begins rushing around. It complains that Dido is objectified by those around her, but ultimately the story too can see her as nothing more than a symbol for a vaguely referenced abolition movement. It is a bit depressing that the one protogonist the book fails to fully flesh out is its only non-white character. In "Dido," she is only what the story sees in its superficial reading of the Zoffany portrait: a symbol of European priviledge and oppression that runs around being symbolic. How much more interesting she could have been if the book allowed her the same humanity it gives to the other historical figures.
Overall, it's a fast read with some real high points, so just skip the mediocre ones. I'm going to read some of Donoghue's novels during the holidays and hope the sustained plotlined will help even out the quality of writing.
The stories themselves range from okay to wonderful. Stories such as "Revelations," "Words for Things," The Necessity of Burning," and "Looking for Petronilla" are well-paced page-turners. Others fell a bit flat. The most disappointing (perhaps because it had the most potential) was "Dido." It starts out as a critque of the Zoffany portrait of Mansfield's great nieces: Dido Elizabeth Belle, in this interpretation of the portrait, exists to accentuate the pale beauty of her cousin, Lady Elizabeth Murray. Yet the story soon begins rushing around. It complains that Dido is objectified by those around her, but ultimately the story too can see her as nothing more than a symbol for a vaguely referenced abolition movement. It is a bit depressing that the one protogonist the book fails to fully flesh out is its only non-white character. In "Dido," she is only what the story sees in its superficial reading of the Zoffany portrait: a symbol of European priviledge and oppression that runs around being symbolic. How much more interesting she could have been if the book allowed her the same humanity it gives to the other historical figures.
Overall, it's a fast read with some real high points, so just skip the mediocre ones. I'm going to read some of Donoghue's novels during the holidays and hope the sustained plotlined will help even out the quality of writing.
October 4, 2009
Emma Donoghue is a fabulous author. I'm not normally a fan of historical fiction because a lot of it tends to be cheesy/romance sort of stuff, but Donoghue has a Ph.D. specializing in 18th Century British literature and history, and her work is always spot on and fascinating!
In _The Woman Who Gave Birth to Rabbits_, Donoghue takes actual historical figures and expands on their stories, writing speculative short fiction about their lives. For instance, she writes a story about a girl who was a charge of Mary Wollstonecraft during Wollstonecraft's short career as a nanny.
Just a wonderful book! Highly recommended.
In _The Woman Who Gave Birth to Rabbits_, Donoghue takes actual historical figures and expands on their stories, writing speculative short fiction about their lives. For instance, she writes a story about a girl who was a charge of Mary Wollstonecraft during Wollstonecraft's short career as a nanny.
Just a wonderful book! Highly recommended.
Shelved as 'did-not-finish'
January 3, 2017This was one of the books I speed-dated to try to weed my to-read list a bit. I would rate this as just not for me - it reminds me of another Donoghue book I tried to read once, Slammerkin, which received that same verdict. I just don't like the forced period writing, it feels too inauthentic the way she does it. I liked Room very much and would still try a future novel, but these stories will be passed on elsewhere.
March 10, 2022
As with every collection this had highs and lows.
Overall this was significantly better than most of the collections I have read but it is poignant to read during Woman's Month.
But I think I am on a nonfiction kick right now and I genuinely wanted longer discussions of these women alongside the stories.
The story of Dido definitely stuck out. As well as that of Wollenscroft. Kyteler and Starre's stories also spoke volumes.
I feel like this is a must read. But I'm starting to think much of Donoghue's work is going to fall in that category.
Overall this was significantly better than most of the collections I have read but it is poignant to read during Woman's Month.
But I think I am on a nonfiction kick right now and I genuinely wanted longer discussions of these women alongside the stories.
The story of Dido definitely stuck out. As well as that of Wollenscroft. Kyteler and Starre's stories also spoke volumes.
I feel like this is a must read. But I'm starting to think much of Donoghue's work is going to fall in that category.
May 10, 2017
These stories were so inventive! Donoghue takes small historical tidbits, like an old song about the plague or a story about a miniature child, and gives the story voice. She makes these forgotten historical notes worthy of consideration and sympathy. Some of the stories are first person, some letters, some omniscient. Donoghue's range was impressive. I loved that she ended each story with a note on where she got her historical information. While many of the stories were dark and rather disturbing, they shed light on what a few women might have experienced in the past.
I would highly recommend.
I would highly recommend.
September 8, 2018
Emma Donoghue never disappoints. There is a delightful breadth to this collection of historically-inspired tales: some reminded me of her historical novel "The Wonder," while some had a different feel that reminded me of another of my favorite short story collections, "Almost Famous Women" by Megan Mayhew Bergman. Some tales are tragic, some are life-affirming, and the last ends on a spine-tingling note. All are powerful.
August 30, 2019
This is a decent collection of short stories about obscure bits of English and Irish history, mainly fleshing out the stories of women who have been forgotten to recorded history. Most are set in the 18th and 19th century, but there are some medieval stories here as well. The stories are pretty uneven - some of them were boring and others (specifically Words for Things and The Necessity of Burning) were fantastic. As always, I love Emma Donoghue's writing.
March 25, 2023
It is a very hard thing to write a review for a book of short stories, but this was an interesting book for sure.
There were a few stories I didn't particularly care for and other I deeply loved. All the writing though was very beautiful and I LOVED all the historical notes and learning about some bits of history I otherwise did not know about.
It was a very peculiar and deeply interesting take on events and people and I'm glad to have read it.
There were a few stories I didn't particularly care for and other I deeply loved. All the writing though was very beautiful and I LOVED all the historical notes and learning about some bits of history I otherwise did not know about.
It was a very peculiar and deeply interesting take on events and people and I'm glad to have read it.
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April 13, 2024An intriguing collection of stories rooted in historical moments. Donoghue includes a short note after each identifying sources and, usually, what is known (historically) of the fate of the main subjects. She imagines/invents what history neglected, for any number of reasons of varying merit, to recall. Each story is a kind of answer to the "what's the ins of that" question that many of us feel when faced by an interesting situation about which we have only outsiders' knowledge.
June 19, 2017
I'm tagging this as historical fiction because, much like another of Donoghue's short story collections, Astray, each of these stories is rooted in the lives and events of actual documented history. I love the way she does this, and there are some real gems in this collection, but on the whole I didn't find it quite as compelling as Astray.
March 11, 2018
Ok, 3.5 stars...close to 4. I actually really liked this collection of short stories based on historical fragments from the 14th- 19th centuries. There were a few that didn't hold my interest at all and a few I found very good...most fell in the middle. I liked the inclusion of the historical notes at the end of each piece.
April 4, 2019
This is a delightful collection of short stories. I loved Emma Donoghue's expressive style and the seeming ease with which she avoided any sense of cliche. Drawn from snippets of historical information and brought to life, these stories sometimes deal with dark and sinister things, yet are also funny and poignant. If you like short and meaningful reads, this is a great book to pick up.
April 16, 2019
I loved the premise for this book stories all surrounded quirky old English history, however I didn’t love the actual stories. I didn’t not like them either. I am glad I read the book, but these stories didn’t make me feel anything special or stick with me after I was done reading them like great short stories do. I would have given this book a 3.5 if able. Enjoyable read but nothing special.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 166 reviews