Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present
Mary, Lady Chudleigh
-
Standard Name: Chudleigh, Mary,,, Lady
Birth Name: Mary Lee
Married Name: Mary Chudleigh
Titled: Mary, Lady Chudleigh
Pseudonym: Marissa
Pseudonym: M--y C.
Used Form: A Lady
Mary, Lady Chudleigh
, was a versatile writer who began publishing during her middle age. Her poems and essays are earnest on religious topics but vividly dramatic in feminist debate. She wrote letters which were not for publication. Her surviving works are merely the tip of the iceberg. She reached print late in life: though she published in the eighteenth century, she must have written a great deal before that century began.
She backs this pleasure in modernity with a remarkable grasp of former female history and of the women's literary tradition in English and its contexts. She mentions the Greek foremother Sappho
, the patriotic heroism...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text
Jane Williams
JW
surveys the field diligently from the sixteenth century onwards. She insists in principle, however, that no artistic talent in a woman justifies the neglect of even the smallest act of domestic duty.
Blain, Virginia et al., editors. The Feminist Companion to Literature in English: Women Writers from the Middle Ages to the Present. Yale University Press; Batsford.
This belief...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text
Martha Fowke
Several of her poems in this collection wrestle with the conflict between gender and ambition. MF
complains vigorously of feeling oppressed because of her sex—I was, oh, hated Thought! a Woman made; / For...
Textual Production
Elizabeth Thomas
The same year Thomas read with horror and disgust the misogynist sermon preached in Dorset by the Rev. John Sprint
. This was war: she later described in a poem To the Lady Chudleigh
...
Textual Production
Elizabeth Carter
EC
had promised Catherine Talbot
that she would undertake the project of making a scholarly translation of the Enchiridion by Epictetus
.
This work of ancient Greek stoic philosophy was something of a favourite with...
Textual Production
Eugenia
The Eugenia who published The Female Advocate chose a favourite title as well as a favourite pseudonym. The title had already been used by Sarah Fyge
, 1686, and was to be used again by...
Textual Production
Martha Fowke
The first is An Epitaph on the late Excellent and Ingenious Lady, the Lady Chudley
, of Aston in Devonshire (actually more of an elegy); the second is On a Silk-Paper at a Fair Lady's...
Textual Features
Elizabeth Thomas
This collection contains the harvest of Thomas's poetic career. Her Muse, she says, is unfashionably incapable of dealing with love or obscenity: this shows clearly that her original poetic context was a Restoration one.
Thomas, Elizabeth. Miscellany Poems on Several Subjects. Thomas Combes.
50-1
Performance of text
Jennifer Johnston
Her Selected Short Plays, published in 2003, includes the texts of Moonlight and Music (a one-acter first produced during the YK2 Festival at Dublin in 2000),Mustn't Forget High Noon, O Ananias, Azarias...
Occupation
John Dryden
By this time Dryden's two careers as writer and dramatist were well launched. The first depended on his ability to please the Stuart court, and the second on his ability to please a theatre audience...
Literary responses
Eugenia
Chudleigh
praised Eugenia
's ingenious Pen in a poem she published in 1703.
Blain, Virginia et al., editors. The Feminist Companion to Literature in English: Women Writers from the Middle Ages to the Present. Yale University Press; Batsford.
Perry, Ruth. The Celebrated Mary Astell: An Early English Feminist. University of Chicago Press.
106
George Berkeley
's use of long passages from this text, unattributed, in...
Intertextuality and Influence
Elizabeth Tollet
The long epistle mentioned on the title-page, a philosophical poem On the Origin of the World, and the two Latin psalms are the works that show most revision since the earlier volume.
Londry, Michael, and Elizabeth Tollet. The Poems of Elizabeth Tollet. Oxford University.
The diary's first volume opens with a preface which expresses conventional modesty bluntly, without the customary effort at elegance or grace: Books generally begin with a Preface which draws in the Reader to go on...
Timeline
1656: Abraham Cowley published Poems; this volume,...
Writing climate item
1656
Abraham Cowley
published Poems; this volume, which included his Pindaric Odes and Miscellanies, confirmed his stature as the leading poet of the day.
11 May 1699: The Rev. John Sprint preached a notorious...
Building item
11 May 1699
The Rev. John Sprint
preached a notorious misogynist wedding sermon at Sherborne in Dorset.
1 December 1699: John Pomfret published The Choice, a poem...
Writing climate item
1 December 1699
John Pomfret
published The Choice, a poem in praise of the good life; among many other poems sharing this title, or that of The Wish, Pomfret's became a long-lived favourite.
1717: The worthy authors chosen for a miscellany...
Women writers item
1717
The worthy authors chosen for a miscellany entitled The Agreeable Variety by its female editor included Behn
, Philips
, Chudleigh
, and Finch
.
September 1727: Edmund Curll issued (with no publisher mentioned...
Writing climate item
September 1727
Edmund Curll
issued (with no publisher mentioned in the colophon but with his name signed to the dedication) Whartoniana in two volumes, often referred to as the work of Philip, Duke of Wharton
.
Texts
Mary, Lady Chudleigh,. Essays upon Several Subjects in Prose and Verse. R. Bonwick, 1710.
Mary, Lady Chudleigh,. “Introduction”. The Poems and Prose of Mary, Lady Chudleigh, edited by Margaret J. M. Ezell, Oxford University Press, 1993, p. xvii - xxxvi.
Mary, Lady Chudleigh,. Poems on Several Occasions. B. Lintott, 1703.
Mary, Lady Chudleigh,. The Ladies Defence. John Deeve, 1701.
Mary, Lady Chudleigh,. The Poems and Prose of Mary, Lady Chudleigh. Editor Ezell, Margaret J. M., Oxford University Press, 1993.