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Medieval People

Medieval People
By Eileen Power

Eileen Edna LePoer Power was born in Atrincham, Cheshire, England on January 9,1889. Power attended Girton College and the Sorbonne. She was described as "an unconventional woman for her time" one example of this is her open criticism of the foreign policy of Britain and active membership in the Union of Democratic Control (Berg). "Powers was Director of History at Girton College from 1913-21, Lecturer in Political Science at the London School of Economics 1921-24, and Reader of the University of London 1924-31, then returning to the London School of Economics as Professor of Economic History in 1931" (Berg). In 1927, Power founded the Economic History Review and in 1933 with, William Beveridge, started the Academic Freedom Committee that "helped academics fleeing for Nazi Germany" (Berg). In 1937, Power married a fellow historian Michael Postan and a year later became Professor of Economic History at Cambridge University. Mrs. Power, at the age of fifty-one, died of heart failure in 1940 leaving behind several books she wrote during her life and the legacy of a pioneering woman and leading historian of her time. A few more books, and a collection of her lectures, were published posthumously" (Berg).
The sources Power uses are as entertaining, interesting, and historically significant as the stories themselves. She went through the books and records, reading the intimate, romantic, and sometimes hard to read business letters and extensive wills left behind. This must have been at times engrossing and other times frustrating. The extensive research was very time consuming and an obvious labor of love. The objectivity in Power's stories is what makes her books considered, even still, academic and historical sources. Power's books, including this one, are widely regarded as "classics" (Berg).
"Social history sometimes suffers from the reproach that it is vague and general, unable to compete with the attractions of political...