Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present
Anna Letitia Barbauld
-
Standard Name: Barbauld, Anna Letitia
Birth Name: Anna Letitia Aikin
Nickname: Nancy
Married Name: Anna Letitia Barbauld
Pseudonym: A Dissenter
Pseudonym: A Volunteer
Pseudonym: Bob Short
Used Form: Mrs Barbauld
Used Form: Anna Laetitia Barbauld
ALB
, writing and publishing in the late eighteenth and the early nineteenth century, was a true woman of letters, an important poet, revered as mouthpiece or laureate for Rational Dissent. Her ground-breaking work on literary, political, social, and other intellectual topics balances her still better-known pedagogical works and writings for the very young. During her lifetime an extraordinary revolution in public opinion made her vilified as markedly as she had been revered.
CB
included in her collection the well-known writers Hannah More
, Charlotte Elizabeth Tonna
, Anna Letitia Barbauld
, and Sarah Trimmer
. Subjects of other sketches which also appeared separately included many of evangelical...
Friends, Associates
Joanna Baillie
Over the course of her long life JB
made dozens of well-loved friends, many of them either professional writers like herself or else writing amateurs. They included Lucy Aikin
, Mary Berry
, Eliza Fletcher
Friends, Associates
Joanna Baillie
Scott was in London in February this year. She corresponded with him for years, discussing their own and others' literary works along with family news. Baillie tried tactfully to explain to him the right way...
Literary responses
Joanna Baillie
The Critical Review assumed the author was male. It thought the versification monotonous but warmly praised both preface and plays.
Critical Review. W. Simpkin and R. Marshall.
24 (1798): 1-22
Initial reaction from individuals (mostly favourable) concentrated on the puzzle of authorship...
Literary responses
Joanna Baillie
The Critical Review called this volume a work of such great and original merit,
Critical Review. W. Simpkin and R. Marshall.
2d ser. 37: 201
though it also said that JB
's initial success had been fed by her anonymity. Anna Letitia Barbauld
Travel
Sarah Austin
The young Sarah Taylor (later SA
) was sent to London to stay with her mother's friend the writer Anna Letitia Barbauld
.
Hamburger, Lotte, and Joseph Hamburger. Troubled Lives: John and Sarah Austin. University of Toronto Press.
21
Leisure and Society
Sarah Austin
Barbauld
introduced SA
to theatre, opera, and metropolitan conversation.
Hamburger, Lotte, and Joseph Hamburger. Troubled Lives: John and Sarah Austin. University of Toronto Press.
21
Friends, Associates
Lucy Aikin
LA
, dining with Walter Scott
, was pleased that though she herself went unnoticed, Scott devoted considerable attention to her aunt Barbauld
.
Aikin, Lucy. Memoirs, Miscellanies and Letters. Editor Le Breton, Philip Hemery, Longman, Green, Longman, Roberts, and Green.
98-9
Textual Production
Lucy Aikin
Anna Letitia Le Breton
, niece of LA
, published two works concerning her: Memoir of Mrs. Barbauld (based on Aikin's manuscript Family History) and her correspondence with William Ellery Channing
.
Aikin, Lucy. Correspondence of William Ellery Channing, D. D., and Lucy Aikin, from 1826 to 1842. Editor Le Breton, Anna Letitia, Roberts.
Family and Intimate relationships
Lucy Aikin
LA
was Anna Letitia Barbauld
's niece. She regarded the literary careers of her aunt and her father with great admiration.
Gentleman’s Magazine. Various publishers.
(1864) 1: 396
Education
Lucy Aikin
LA
was educated at home by her mother. Because she did not learn to read as quickly as others in the family, her grandmother (who fondly remembered the unequalled early brilliance of her own daughter,...
Occupation
Lucy Aikin
In 1803 LA
and her aunt Anna Letitia Barbauld
founded an all-women book club at Stoke Newington. The officers were all women, and Aikin boasted that not a single man is admitted, even to...
Friends, Associates
Lucy Aikin
In her memoirs LA
claims to have been acquainted with all the notable literary women of her time. She was a close friend of Joanna Baillie
and Elizabeth Ogilvy Benger
. Another important friend and...
Textual Features
Lucy Aikin
Though most of her anthologized writers are men, LA
includes Hannah More
, Anna Letitia Barbauld
, and Lady Luxborough
. Perhaps recalling her own childhood activism, she included anti-slavery poems.
Textual Production
Lucy Aikin
Though LA
continued to write for children, and edited various writings by her aunt
and her father
, she did not think of herself as a writer in the same sense that they were. Her...
