The Blazing World

The Duchess, a woman from our Earth whose soul finds its way to the Blazing World first as an amanuensis for the Empress and then becomes her most trusted adviser and friend, is a fictionalized version of Cavendish herself. Cavendish blurs the lines between fiction and fact in many ways, making The Blazing World metafiction—prose that draws attention to its own creation and fictiveness. Cavendish’s self-insertion allows her to expound her personal, political, and literary beliefs, and to offer herself the kind of praise she wishes would come from her contemporaries: For example, the immaterial spirits introduce her as “a plain and rational Writer” whose work primarily features “Sense and Reason” (119).

The biographical details of the Duchess’s life with the Duke reflect William Cavendish’s actual life. The Duchess’s is keen to restore her husband’s estates to their pre-Civil War size—something Cavendish was also working on in reality. Just as she uses the text to praise herself, Cavendish also compliments her husband in a fantastical trial that underscores his virtuous nature, using fiction to argue her case for her husband.

One of the Duchess’s most striking features is her “extreme Ambition” (121), which includes wanting to be a princess, a renowned author, and at the end of the text, to be immortal. Her aspirations are so extreme that “neither she her self, nor no Creature in the World was able to know either the height, depth or breadth of her ambition” (121). The Duchess’s ambitions mirror Cavendish’s own: In her address to the reader and the epilogue, Cavendish describes herself “as Ambitious as ever any of my Sex was, is, or can be; which makes, that though I cannot be Henry the Fifth, or Charles the Second, yet, I endeavour to be Margaret the First” (60). Much as the Duchess created several worlds to rule in her imagination, so too has Cavendish triumphed over famed male political leaders: Since “Fortune and the Fates would give” her no country to rule, she instead “made a World of [her] own” (60) by writing The Blazing World. She returns to this idea in the epilogue: “my ambition is not onely to be Empress, but Authoress of a whole World” (163). This shared metafictional ambition reinforces Cavendish’s belief that fiction can lead to truth and knowledge.

The Epilogue blurs the line between the Duchess and Cavendish entirely, as the author describes the Empress as “my dear Platonick Friend” (163-64) and speaks of the Blazing World as a place she has actually been to.

The Emperor, whose main function in the plot is to marry the Lady who becomes Empress and then to support her endeavors and her friendship with the Duchess, is Cavendish’s model for ideal male rulers. He is a beloved absolute monarch who rules a united and prosperous paradise. His citizens “all submitted with the greatest duty and obedience” (67).

However, despite the seeming implications of this incredibly conservative and traditional style of government, the Emperor is a radical progressive in other ways, particularly in his views on gender. As soon as he marries the Lady, the Emperor is happy to completely share power—so much so that he “gave her an absolute power to rule and govern all that World as she pleased” (70) without any interference from him. Cavendish uses the Emperor to reject gender conventions and argue that women are capable of ruling.

The Emperor also reflects Cavendish’s vision of ideal marriage. He loves the Empress dearly. When the Empress’s soul is in the Duchess’s world, “the Emperours Soul was so sad and melancholy, for want of His own beloved soul” (133). When the Empress is upset, he “endeavoured to comfort her as much as possibly he could” (143). He is also not jealous or insecure; instead, he supports the Empress’s political and personal ambitions and often suggests she send for the Duchess to give advice on political, military, and cultural matters that flummox him.

The Empress’s old country, ESFI, is war-torn and divided partly because its king is hemmed in his decision-making by his council. The Empress can think of only one solution: to step in to defeat ESFI’s attackers and then to make its king “the most powerful Monarch of all that World” (151). It is the Empress’s power and authority that turns her old country into an absolute monarchy under the king’s exclusive command.

Unlike the Empress, who can make unilateral decisions to switch the Blazing World’s religion or governing structures, ESFI’s king makes few, if any, decisions. Instead, he must wait for his council to resolve matters: For example, when the Empress offers the King assistance, it is up to the council to respond, which they do incredibly slowly as “they could not suddenly resolve what answer to send the Empress” (148). The Duchess explains that “Great Councels are most commonly slow, because many men have many several Opinions: besides, every Councellor striving to be the wisest, makes long speeches, and raise many doubts, which cause retardments” (148-49). This parodic exaggeration illustrates Cavendish’s belief that a single ruler making decisions quickly and unilaterally is better than a system of checks and balances.