Hello,

Iā€™m a writer and arts journalist based in London. I have written features, book reviews, and art reviews for newspapers and magazines including the Telegraph, The Times, The New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times, Spectator, and Prospect. My writing has led to appearances on podcasts and radio, including BBC Front Row and Free Thinking. For the academic year 2024/25, I am an Ertegun Scholar at the University of Oxford.

My first book, Pure Wit: The Revolutionary Life of Margaret Cavendish, was published by Head of Zeus in September 2023 in the United Kingdom, and by Pegasus Books in January 2024 in the United States. Pure Wit was a Spectator and History Today book of the year for 2023, and received starred reviews in Kirkus and Publishers Weekly.

I am represented by Sabhbh Curran at Curtis Brown.

Commission me, or say hi, at francesca.peacock@outlook.com.

Many months ago, I was sitting at a different desk and puzzling out the odd combination of Rachel Cusk and Ancrene Wisse. The unusual pairing was part of working out how gossip could be a literary genre. When the issue of @lareviewofbooks landed on o
last week I made a (crazy) 36-hour trip to New York: saw the absolute queen @nicole.kitsberg, found my book in barnes and noble on 5th ave, spent way too much in @mcnallyjackson, and got the most beautiful train journey ever up to @bardcollege to tal
sprint, scurry, run to see the @britishlibrary’s exhibition ‘Medieval Women: In their Own Words’. Christine de Pizan MSS; 13th century beauty guides (and scents to rival Diptyque); Paston letters (including the letter I quoted in my
room with a view & ‘latin: an intensive guide’ being romantic honeymoon reading
spent a lot of this summer not realising I was taking flower and foliage pics on b&w film; oddly happy with the results
Very excited to be in conversation with @mark.a.bowles about his debut novel All My Precious Madness next week — with @galley_beggar_press and @spiraclehq. Come join! Link for tickets is in my bio šŸ’™