The Winthrop Woman by Anya Seton

A book review

Anya Seton's meticulously researched biographical novel The Winthrop Woman is about Elizabeth Fones, the scandalous niece of John Winthrop, one of the Puritan founders and governors of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Elizabeth migrated there with the Winthrop family in 1631 after the death of her first husband, John Winthrop's son Henry. The first third of the novel is devoted to Elizabeth's life in England, where the Puritans' evolving beliefs clashed with an earlier generation's more relaxed attitudes.

Seton portrays Elizabeth as a woman both sensual and intelligent whose impulsive human warmth often set her at loggerheads with her uncle and sometimes threatened her survival. These conflicts with her uncle form the spine of the story and her relationships with men its flesh and blood, but her brief encounter with religious dissenter Anne Hutchinson is The Winthrop Woman's heart:

"Anne put her head on one side, considering, and then she smiled. 'I do not believe He is ever wroth with those who love enough, for God is Love.'

"'I've never heard so,' cried Elizabeth, startled. 'Does it say so in Scriptures? I've heard that He is jealous, and a consuming fire, and almighty, and our salvation, but I never heard of love.'" (1958, 586 pages, with a historical note)