Godwin and his historical context

William Godwin (1756-1836), philosophical anarchist, novelist and intellectual, kept a diary from 1788 until a few weeks before his death. The diary has recently been transcribed and edited and is available on the web at: http://godwindiary.bodleian.ox.ac.uk. It offers a hugely detailed if deeply cryptic window on Godwin's literary life, his familial life (as the lover and then husband of Mary Wollstonecraft and the father of Mary...