Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present
Elizabeth Montagu
-
Standard Name: Montagu, Elizabeth
Birth Name: Elizabeth Robinson
Nickname: Fidget
Nickname: The Two Peas (with Sarah Scott)
Nickname: The Queen of the Blues
Married Name: Elizabeth Montagu
EM
, eighteenth-century Bluestocking leader, is known on the one hand as an informal letter-writer, and on the other hand for ambitious critical intervention in canonicity and cultural debates, with her critical study of Shakespeare
and dialogues of the dead.
There were fifty stipends on offer and more than five hundred people applied. Moreover, the terms of the charity turned out to exclude Welsh people. All her life Williams found personal friends more helpful than...
Wealth and Poverty
Elizabeth Carter
EC
was proud of her financial independence (though she also accepted support from her wealthy friend Elizabeth Montagu
and from Archbishop Secker
, patron of her friend Catherine Talbot). She leased from Secker a group...
Wealth and Poverty
Sarah Fielding
In later years she received financial aid from her half-brother Sir John Fielding
(who paid her £20 most years from 1761), from Ralph Allen
(who left her a legacy of £100 in August 1764), and...
Wealth and Poverty
Ann Yearsley
The newly-rescued Yearsleys came to the attention of Hannah More in her capacity not as writer but as philanthropist. She found AY
to be respectable, was impressed by her poetry, and decided that the best...
Travel
Elizabeth Carter
EC
travelled in Europe with Elizabeth Montagu
and Lord Bath
.
Pennington, Montagu, and Elizabeth Carter. Memoirs of the Life of Mrs Elizabeth Carter. F. C. and J. Rivington.
I: 270-2
Myers, Sylvia Harcstark. The Bluestocking Circle: Women, Friendship, and the Life of the Mind in Eighteenth-Century England. Clarendon.
194
Travel
Hester Lynch Piozzi
They spent three years in Italy. HLP
had a wonderful time. Meanwhile in England Elizabeth Montagu
, among many others, subscribed to malicious unfounded rumours of Gabriel Piozzi's cruelty, dissipation, financial extravagance, and allegedly locking...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text
Henrietta Maria Bowdler
In this work HMB
warns against improper choice of friends and the excesses of romantic friendship, even while she idealises true friendship. She praises the well-employed talents of Elizabeth Montagu
, Elizabeth Smith
, Hannah More
Theme or Topic Treated in Text
Anne Grant
This contains autobiographical fragments and insightful comments on other women writers. Objects of AG
's comment include Susan Ferrier
, Charlotte Smith
(whose poems AG
felt to be easy, flowing, and correct, but low on...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text
Melesina Trench
About the first twenty pages are occupied by MT
's early reminiscences, probably written not long after her first husband's death: she frankly recorded her emotional disturbance over that event.
Trench, Melesina. The Remains of the Late Mrs. Richard Trench. Editor Trench, Richard Chenevix, Parker and Bourn.
18
Later pages mix letters...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text
Mary Deverell
The second volume opens with poems on On Heroism in Female Virtue and On the Friendship between two Ladies. MD
praises Elizabeth Montagu
, Marie de Sévigné
, Anne Bacon
, and others, some...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text
Frances Reynolds
FR
pays particular attention to his relations with women, individually and in general: Johnson set a higher value upon female friendship than, perhaps, most men.
Reynolds, Frances. “Recollections of Dr. Johnson”. Johnsonian Miscellanies, edited by George Birkbeck Hill and George Birkbeck Hill, Clarendon Press, pp. 2: 250 - 300.
2: 252
She remarks on the paternal affection he entertained...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text
Mary Scott
MS
brings her list up to date with significant women writers who have published since the appearance of The Feminead. Her information is not perfect—she credits Anna Williams
with some works actually written by...
HM
composed a Prefatory Letter to Montagu
, telling her about Yearsley
, designed for printing at the head of Yearsley's poems to be published by subscription.
Waldron, Mary. Lactilla, Milkwoman of Clifton: The Life and Writings of Ann Yearsley, 1753-1806. University of Georgia Press.
60
Textual Production
Hannah More
HM
wrote to tell Montagu
of Yearsley
's blackest ingratitude.
Waldron, Mary. Lactilla, Milkwoman of Clifton: The Life and Writings of Ann Yearsley, 1753-1806. University of Georgia Press.
65
Timeline
5 December 1738: The trial opened in which Theophilus Cibber...
Building item
5 December 1738
The trial opened in which Theophilus Cibber
sued William Sloper
for adultery, claiming £5,000 damages: virtually the trial of Susannah Cibber
. The jury found Sloper guilty but signified their opinion of Theophilus by awarding...
1 May 1749: Elizabeth Chudleigh created a sensation by...
Building item
1 May 1749
Elizabeth Chudleigh
created a sensation by appearing at a masquerade in the character of Iphigenia, in a dress so transparent that she was as good as naked.
22 March 1754: A group of Nobles, Clergy, Gentlemen, & Merchants...
Building item
22 March 1754
A group of Nobles, Clergy, Gentlemen, & Merchants met to establish what became the Royal Society of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce.
10 August 1758: The Magdalen Hospital (for fallen women)...
Building item
10 August 1758
The Magdalen Hospital
(for fallen women) opened in Prescot Street, London, after a considerable campaign to influence public opinion.
31 May 1766: Coalmine-owner and bluestocking Elizabeth...
Building item
31 May 1766
Coalmine-owner and bluestocking Elizabeth Montagu
, who had already commented acidly on the narrowness of Newcastle streets, wrote of its people as little better than Savages.
July 1773: The Westminster Magazine printed, along with...
Building item
July 1773
The Westminster Magazine printed, along with its account of Oxford University
's annual degree-giving, an article by L. P.On the Propriety of Bestowing Academical Honours on the Ladies.
By April 1774: A Father's Legacy to His Daughters, by Dr...
Building item
By April 1774
A Father's Legacy to His Daughters, by Dr John Gregory
, was posthumously published.
April 1774: The Monthly Review, in a notice on Hannah...
Women writers item
April 1774
The Monthly Review, in a notice on Hannah More
's The Inflexible Captive, quoted some lines which transform the Muses from ancient Greece into the living female poets of Britain.
28 November 1776: The otherwise unidentified Mrs H. Cartwright...
Women writers item
28 November 1776
The otherwise unidentified Mrs H. Cartwright
wrote the dedication to Elizabeth Montagu
of her first work, Letters on Female Education Addressed to a Married Lady, which appeared early the next year.
1777: Richard Samuel engraved his Nine Living Muses...
Women writers item
1777
Richard Samuel
engraved his Nine Living Muses of Great Britain (or Portraits in the Character of the Muses in the Temple of Apollo) for Johnson's Ladies New and Polite Pocket Memorandum for 1778...
1785: Dialogues Concerning the Ladies, a celebration...
Women writers item
1785
Dialogues Concerning the Ladies, a celebration of famous women, was anonymously published; it borrows from Ballard
's Memoirs of Eminent Ladies.
By early October 1930: London publisher Gerald Howe issued a composite...
Building item
By early October 1930
London publisher Gerald Howe issued a composite biography entitled Six Women of the World, which had previously made up six volumes in a Representative Women series, 1927-9.
Texts
Montagu, Elizabeth, and George, first Baron Lyttelton. “Dialogues XXVI, XXVII, XXVIII”. Dialogues of the Dead, Garland, 1970, pp. 291-20.
Climenson, Emily J., and Elizabeth Montagu. Elizabeth Montagu, The Queen of the Bluestockings. Her Correspondence from 1720 to 1761. John Murray, 1906.
Montagu, Elizabeth. Essay on Shakespear. J. Dodsley, 1769.
Blunt, Reginald, and Elizabeth Montagu. Mrs Montagu, "Queen of the Blues", Her Letters and Friendships from 1762 to 1800. Constable, 1923.
Montagu, Elizabeth. “MSS MO 1-6923”. Huntington Library Manuscripts.
Montagu, Elizabeth. The Letters of Mrs. Elizabeth Montagu. Editor Montagu, Matthew, T. Cadell and W. Davies, 1813.