Mary Elizabeth Braddon

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Standard Name: Braddon, Mary Elizabeth
Birth Name: Mary Elizabeth Braddon
Pseudonym: Mary Seyton
Pseudonym: Babington White
Pseudonym: Lady Caroline Lascelles
Pseudonym: Aunt Belinda
Pseudonym: The author of Lady Audley's Secret
Self-constructed Name: M. E. Braddon
Married Name: Mary Elizabeth Maxwell
Used Form: Miss M. E. Braddon
MEB made her name, scandalously, in the early 1860s as a founder of the intricately plotted sensation novel, and was particularly known for her transgressive heroines. Although still most strongly associated with this and the related genres of gothic, mystery and detective stories, she also contributed significantly during her 56-year career to the psychological and realist novels, in addition to writing several dramas (some of them produced) and publishing in her youth one long poem in a collection with shorter ones. Dedicated to writing for the new and expanding mass reading public (including fiction for the penny press), and associated from the outset with novel advertising and publishing practices, she issued her work serially, edited Belgravia magazine from 1866 to 1876 (as well as a Christmas annual), and survived the demise of the triple-decker novel.

Connections

Connections Sort ascending Author name Excerpt
Wealth and Poverty Rhoda Broughton
RB , who published almost exclusively with Bentley throughout her career, preferred to receive a lump sum for her novels rather than to rely on royalites and copyright earnings. In her reminiscence Ethel Arnold suggests...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Edith J. Simcox
EJS could be unreservedly critical in her reviews: she deemed Mary Elizabeth Braddonanother victim to the diseased appetite of the class that would rather read half-a-dozen bad novels than one good one, and...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Theodora Benson
In 1951 TB returned to partnership with Bentley though not with Askwith in a different treatment of famous people, London Immortals in Allan Wingate 's The Londoners' Library series. This goes through London street by...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Vernon Lee
In her first essay, Lee offers a summary analysis of the English novelistic tradition. Judging them especially, though not entirely, on their treatments of morality, she evaluates writers including Jane Austen , Maria Edgeworth ,...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Sarah Tytler
Clearly delighted with the opportunity to mix in literary circles, ST recorded her personal observations of these authors in Men and Women Met by the Way, the final 100-page-long section of her family autobiography...
Textual Production Anna Maria Hall
In her capacity as editor of this journal she mentored and supervised Mary Elizabeth Braddon , who was also working for it. The St. James's Magazine continued to publish (ending on the original title after...
Textual Production Lucy Walford
On 24 June this year Mudie's radically reduced the price it would pay publishers per volume (already well below the price charged to other buyers). This caused publishers (led by Simpkin, Marshall with their issue...
Textual Production Elizabeth Helme
This book bore the author's name as Elizabeth Helme, Jun. and its preface warns that spoiling children may lead them to rush into the vortex of vice and folly
Somerville, Elizabeth Helme. James Manners, Little John, and Their Dog Bluff. Darton and Harvey.
iii
(a phrase characteristic of sensation...
Textual Production Ellen Wood
The novel had been twice offered to the publishing house of Chapman and Hall , and was recommended by William Harrison Ainsworth . After their reader (novelist George Meredith ) twice rejected it, EW took...
Textual Production Henry James
Although HJ is best remembered as a novelist, he was also a prolific and insightful critic of literature and the arts. Over the course of his career he reviewed many novels by British women writers...
Textual Production Bryony Lavery
BL 's numerous plays for radio include some original and some adapted from other works: Laying Ghosts, The Twelve Days of Christmas, Velma and Therese (a parallel version of the film Thelma and...
Textual Production Katharine S. Macquoid
KSM first reached print with a short story in a recently-launched periodical, The Welcome Guest, A Magazine for All.
Her publications here and later in Temple Bar and Belgravia magazines suggest a sustained connection...
Textual Production Mary Fortune
If MF is indeed the author of either The Stolen Specimens or Traces of Crime, then she is, Lucy Sussex argues, the earliest known female writer of detective fiction. Both stories pre-date the serialization...
Textual Production Helen Mathers
The story, a sketch of her brother-in-law Mr Hamborough and his wife (the author's sister), was inspired by a visit with them to Jersey in the Channel Islands.
Black, Helen C. Notable Women Authors of the Day. D. Bryce.
75
It was composed, rapidly put...
Textual Features Charlotte Chanter
Critic John Sutherland discerns the influence of Wilkie Collins on the novel's plot. Certainly the figure of the mysterious woman in black who aims to avenge herself on her husband's destroyers recalls the description of...

Timeline

1532-early 1552: These years saw the gradual appearance of...

Writing climate item

1532-early 1552

These years saw the gradual appearance of the work of scurrilous, obscene, and philosophicalsatire generally known in English as Gargantua and Pantagruel, by François Rabelais (1483?-?9 April 1553).

1826: American-born black actor Ira Aldridge debuted...

Building item

1826

American-born black actor Ira Aldridge debuted in London as Othello at the Royalty Theatre .

1842: A bill to legalize marriage between a man...

Building item

1842

A bill to legalize marriage between a man and his deceased wife's sister was introduced in the House of Commons . It did not pass.

1843: John Maxwell founded his own publishing house...

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1843

John Maxwell founded his own publishing house in London.

1 October-15 December 1856: Gustave Flaubert serially published his first...

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1 October-15 December 1856

Gustave Flaubert serially published his first novel, Madame Bovary, in the Revue de Paris.

1858: Brothers William and Edward Tinsley formed...

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1858

Brothers William and Edward Tinsley formed a partnership as the Tinsley Brothers , publishers, at 18 Catherine Street, Strand, London.

18 November 1861: The English production of Dion Boucicault's...

Writing climate item

18 November 1861

The English production of Dion Boucicault 's The Octoroon, or Life in Louisiana opened at the Adelphi Theatre , London.

April 1863: Henry Mansel in the Quarterly Review attacked...

Writing climate item

April 1863

Henry Mansel in the Quarterly Review attacked sensation novels as preaching to the nerves and as indications of a wide-spread corruption, of which they are in part both the effect and the cause; called into...

Later 1866: Robert Williams Buchanan published an essay...

Writing climate item

Later 1866

Robert Williams Buchanan published an essay on Immorality in Authorship in the Fortnightly Review, and, under the pseudonym of Caliban in the Spectator, attacked Swinburne in a poem called The Session of the Poets.

1867: Metta Victoria Fuller Victor (a successful...

Writing climate item

1867

Metta Victoria Fuller Victor (a successful American writer and publisher, as was her husband, Orville James Victor ) serialised under the pseudonym Seeley Regester her novelThe Dead Letter.
American National Biography. http://www.anb.org/articles/home.html.
under Orville James Victor
Nickerson, Catherine Ross, and Metta Victoria Fuller Victor. “Introduction”. The Dead Letter; and, The Figure Eight, Duke University Press, pp. 1-10.
1-2

1868: Tractarian F. E. Paget published his satiric...

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1868

Tractarian F. E. Paget published his satiricsensation novelLucretia; or, the Heroine of the Nineteenth Century.

1875: Charles Reade dedicated his novel The Wandering...

Writing climate item

1875

Charles Reade dedicated his novelThe Wandering Heir to Mary Elizabeth Braddonas a slight mark of respect for her private virtues and public talents.
Wolff, Robert Lee. Sensational Victorian. Garland.
250

1876: John Maxwell sold Belgravia to Chatto and...

Writing climate item

1876

John Maxwell sold Belgravia to Chatto and Windus , ending Mary Elizabeth Braddon 's association with the monthly.

Late 1884: Publisher Henry Vizetelly produced the first...

Writing climate item

Late 1884

Publisher Henry Vizetelly produced the first English translations of Émile Zola : the novels Nana and L'Assommoir.

27 June 1894: Mudie's Circulating Library and bookseller...

Writing climate item

27 June 1894

Mudie's Circulating Library and bookseller W. H. Smith together announced they would not pay more than four shillings a volume for novels; this forced publishers to abandon triple-decker format, and quickly led to its replacement...

Texts

Braddon, Mary Elizabeth. A Strange World. Donohue, Henneberry.
Braddon, Mary Elizabeth. A Strange World. J. Maxwell, 1875.
Willis, Chris et al. “Afterword”. The Trail of the Serpent, edited by Chris Willis and Chris Willis, Modern Library, 2003, pp. 408-14.
Braddon, Mary Elizabeth. Aurora Floyd. Tinsley Brothers, 1863.
Braddon, Mary Elizabeth. Aurora Floyd. Editors Nemesvari, Richard and Lisa Surridge, Broadview, 1998.
Braddon, Mary Elizabeth. Beyond These Voices. Hutchinson, 1910.
Braddon, Mary Elizabeth. Birds of Prey. Ward, Lock, and Tyler, 1867.
Braddon, Mary Elizabeth. Charlotte’s Inheritance. Ward, Lock, and Tyler , 1868.
Braddon, Mary Elizabeth. Circe. Ward, Lock, and Tyler, 1867.
Braddon, Mary Elizabeth. Dead Love has Chains. Hurst and Blackett, 1907.
Braddon, Mary Elizabeth. Dead Love Has Chains. Sensation Press, 2001.
Wolff, Robert Lee et al. “Devoted Disciple: The Letters of Mary Elizabeth Braddon to Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton, 1862-1873”. Harvard Library Bulletin, Vol.
22
, pp. 1 - 35, 129.
Braddon, Mary Elizabeth. Eleanor’s Victory. B. Tauchnitz, 1863.
Braddon, Mary Elizabeth. Eleanor’s Victory. Tinsley Brothers, 1863.
Braddon, Mary Elizabeth. “Flower and Weed”. The Mistletoe Bough, J. and R. Maxwell, 1882.
Braddon, Mary Elizabeth. Garibaldi and Other Poems. Bosworth and Harrison, 1861.
Braddon, Mary Elizabeth. Henry Dunbar. J. Maxwell, 1864.
Braddon, Mary Elizabeth. Hostages to Fortune. J. Maxwell, 1875.
Braddon, Mary Elizabeth. Hostages to Fortune. J. and R. Maxwell, 1876.
O’Toole, Fionn, and Mary Elizabeth Braddon. “Introduction”. Vixen, Alan Sutton, 1993, p. vii - xi.
Sasaki, Toru et al. “Introduction”. John Marchmont’s Legacy, edited by Toru Sasaki et al., Oxford University Press, 1999, p. vii - xxiv.
Braddon, Mary Elizabeth. “Introduction”. The Octoroon; or, The Lily of Louisiana, edited by Jennifer Carnell, Sensation Press, 1999, p. vii - xvii.
Waters, Sarah, and Mary Elizabeth Braddon. “Introduction”. The Trail of the Serpent, edited by Chris Willis and Chris Willis, Modern Library, 2003, p. xv - xxiv.
Braddon, Mary Elizabeth. Ishmael. J. and R. Maxwell.
Braddon, Mary Elizabeth. Ishmael. J. and R. Maxwell, 1884.