A Domestic Problem

A ship in distress signals for help; Abby Morton Diaz says women must do the same. What problem is so easily overlooked that even dusting can help reveal it?

In this late-nineteenth-century argument about work and culture in the household, Diaz invites women to begin talking—even if their first ideas are uncertain or mistaken. She turns familiar chores inside out: making bread means judging temperatures and timing; dusting means moving, wiping, and replacing every object, while remembering that the work will soon need doing again. Beneath the smooth home presented to husbands and company, she finds a labor that consumes time, skill, and thought. How can women claim room for culture when the household’s countless small duties keep demanding their minds?

With centuries of literature, it's inevitable that some will fall through the cracks. We hunt down public domain works and restore them so they're not lost to the world.

Who are we? We're Cairn Press. Our background is in design, publishing, typography, and technology. These skills fuel our mission to create the highest quality Public Domain eBooks available online, at an affordable price. We give them the treatment they deserve; our proprietary process restores books for a better overall user experience in design, readability, and e-reader compatibility.