Mary Augusta Ward

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Standard Name: Ward, Mary Augusta
Birth Name: Mary Augusta Arnold
Married Name: Mary Augusta Ward
Pseudonym: Mrs Humphry Ward
Best known for her influential loss-of-faith novel Robert Elsmere, MAW was among the more prolific and popular novelists of the later Victorian and Edwardian periods. Her fifty-year career spanned an era of enormous transformation. During it she produced twenty-five novels, an autobiography, journalism (including reviews and literary criticism), a children's book, a translation, and several works of war propaganda. Her more serious earlier works were weighty novels of ideas in the tradition of George Eliot , which seek to chart the complex relationships among character, intellect, religion, and morality. Her work insistently takes up what she sees as the pressing social issues of her day, shifting in the early twentieth century to briefer works on a much wider geographical canvas and then taking up the war effort in both fiction and prose. It displays an abiding interest in the social, intellectual, and sexual relations between men and women. The education and occupations of women are recurrent themes, and Oxford with its intellectual ferment a common setting. Although MAW 's nationalism, imperialism, and anti-suffrage stance cast her as conservative to recent readers, she was a reformer, in her earlier years a democrat, and an acute analyst of gender who believed strongly in the currents of progress and the transformative power of texts.

Connections

Connections Author name Sort descending Excerpt
Occupation Henri-Frédéric Amiel
He became a philosopher and a professor of aesthetics, and published a number of books including a study of Germaine de Staël . His best known work, however, was his diary. It exerted an influence...
Friends, Associates Henri-Frédéric Amiel
In 1885 Mary Augusta Ward published her translation of HFA 's notable diary with the title Amiel's Journal.
OCLC WorldCat. http://www.oclc.org/firstsearch/content/worldcat/. Accessed 1999.
Drabble, Margaret, editor. The Oxford Companion to English Literature. Oxford University Press.
24
Family and Intimate relationships Matthew Arnold
Mary Augusta Ward was MA 's niece; she strongly revered him although they had little contact on literary matters.
Mitchell, Sally, editor. Victorian Britain: An Encyclopedia. Garland Press.
843
Occupation Matthew Arnold
In a letter addressed to his mother and later reprinted by Mary Augusta Ward , MA expressed his intention to lecture in the vernacular, a decisive move in the establishment of English criticism.
Ward, Mary Augusta. A Writer’s Recollections. Harper and Brothers.
55
Education Enid Bagnold
This small, progressive school, which emphasized the study of art, literature, and theatre, was founded and headed by Julia (Mrs Leonard) Huxley , mother of Aldous Huxley and sister of the novelist Mary Augusta Ward
Travel Gertrude Bell
During 1899 GB visited Mrs Humphry Ward in Rome. She also went to Athens with her father, where they watched David Hogarth working on an archaeological dig. She went home via Constantinople, Prague...
politics Gertrude Bell
GB was often scornful of women as a group, and believed that the suffrage movement's militancy would jeopardize the achievements of professional women. Notably, anti-suffragists included many prominent supporters of women's higher education, such as...
Friends, Associates Mary Elizabeth Braddon
The Maxwells had frequent house guests and entertained regularly at both their houses. Later friends and acquaintances included Robert Browning , Mary Cholmondeley , Sir Arthur Conan Doyle , Ford Madox Ford , Thomas Hardy
Literary responses Emily Brontë
Since the early criticism which took its lead from Charlotte's biographical portrait, a biographical and hagiographic industry has arisen around all three Brontë sisters and their home in Haworth. A. Mary F. Robinson published...
Textual Production Emma Frances Brooke
EFB , as the Author of A Superfluous Woman, published Transition. A Novel, which connects feminist and socialist themes and which she intended as an antidote to Marcella by Mrs Humphry Ward ...
Textual Features Rhoda Broughton
This novel begins with the death of Althea Vane's father, and her mother's subsequent decision to escape from her conventional role and abandon her children,
Jones, Shirley et al., editors. “’LOVE’: Rhoda Broughton, Writing and Re-writing Romance”. Popular Victorian Women Writers, Manchester University Press, pp. 208-36.
223
thereby effectively orphaning Althea and her three sisters. Two...
Publishing Mona Caird
MC wrote to the Times about Mary Augusta Ward 's account of the Women's National Anti-Suffrage League , which had been published in the same paper.
“The Times Digital Archive 1785-2007”. Thompson Gale: The Times Digital Archive.
(11 August 1908): 10
Literary responses Joanna Cannan
Favourable reviews of High Table tended to concentrate on its blend of qualities not often found together. The Spectator noted its combination of sympathy and insight with wit and a fine gift of phrase.The...
Education Catherine Carswell
After her discovery of literature, CC 's early reading included many pious books: Bunyan 's Pilgrim's Progress, Foxe 's Book of Martyrs, and Lives of the Saints. She also read widely in...
politics Jane Hume Clapperton
Her signature was among six hundred appended (chosen from those of more than two thousand women supporting the document) to the anonymously-published Women's Suffrage: A Reply. This argument in support of female suffrage appeared...

Timeline

1832: Joseph Henry Parker took over his uncle's...

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1832

Joseph Henry Parker took over his uncle's Oxford bookselling and publishing business; as J. H. Parker it soon became the foremost publisher of the Oxford or Tractarian Movement.

November 1860: Thomas Hill Green became one of the first...

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November 1860

Thomas Hill Green became one of the first laymen to hold a fellowship at Balliol College .

9 August 1870: The Education Act established a national...

National or international item

9 August 1870

The Education Act established a national elementary education system governed by local school boards, to which women could be elected.

December 1874: French actress Sarah Bernhardt was in the...

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December 1874

French actress Sarah Bernhardt was in the first full tide of her success
Ward, Mary Augusta. A Writer’s Recollections. Harper and Brothers.
157
in Paris.

1880: Thomas Humphry Ward published with Macmillan...

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1880

Thomas Humphry Ward published with Macmillan a highly successful four-volume anthology, The English Poets.

December 1882: Henri-Frédéric Amiel's Fragments d'un Journal...

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December 1882

Henri-Frédéric Amiel 's Fragments d'un Journal Intime was posthumously published in Geneva.

7 November 1885: The last spike of the Canadian Pacific Railway...

National or international item

7 November 1885

The last spike of the Canadian Pacific Railway was driven in Eagle Pass, British Columbia, completing the transcontinental railway.

March 1887: Following his appointment as Chief Secretary,...

National or international item

March 1887

Following his appointment as Chief Secretary, Arthur Balfour undertook a policy towards Ireland popularly characterized as killing Home Rule with kindness.

June 1889: Nineteenth Century published An Appeal against...

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June 1889

Nineteenth Century published An Appeal against Female Suffrage by Mary Augusta Ward , signed by 103 other women.

July 1889: Women's Suffrage: A Reply appeared in the...

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July 1889

Women's Suffrage: A Reply appeared in the Fortnightly Review to counter Mary Augusta Ward 's Appeal Against Female Suffrage in the previous month's Nineteenth Century.

1 July 1891: The International Copyright Act, known as...

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1 July 1891

The International Copyright Act, known as the Chace Act, came into force in the United States to protect the copyrights of foreign authors and end the longstanding practice of producing pirated editions of popular British...

1 July 1891: The International Copyright Act, known as...

Writing climate item

1 July 1891

The International Copyright Act, known as the Chace Act, came into force in the United States to protect the copyrights of foreign authors and end the longstanding practice of producing pirated editions of popular British...

November 1896: The Publishers Council objected to series...

Writing climate item

November 1896

The Publishers Council objected to series such as Popular New Novels, The Masterpiece Library, and the Review of Reviews, all of which published abridgements of popular novels and were edited by W. T. Stead .

1899: Josephine Ward published One Poor Scruple:...

Women writers item

1899

Josephine Ward published One Poor Scruple: A Seven Weeks' Story.

11 September 1905: The Times Book Club opened at 93 New Bond...

Writing climate item

11 September 1905

The Times Book Club opened at 93 New Bond Street, London, and quickly ran afoul of the Net Book Agreement.

Texts

Ward, Mary Augusta. ’Missing’. W. Collins, 1917.
Ward, Mary Augusta. A Writer’s Recollections. Harper and Brothers, 1918.
Ward, Mary Augusta. A Writer’s Recollections. W. Collins, 1918.
Amiel, Henri-Frédéric. Amiel’s Journal. Translator Ward, Mary Augusta, Brentano’s, 1928.
Ward, Mary Augusta. “An Appeal Against Female Suffrage”. Nineteenth Century, Vol.
25
, pp. 781-8.
Ward, Mary Augusta, and Albert Sterner. Canadian Born. Smith, Elder, 1910.
Ward, Mary Augusta. Cousin Philip. W. Collins, 1919.
Ward, Mary Augusta, and Fred Pegram. Daphne. Cassell, 1909.
Ward, Mary Augusta. Delia Blanchflower. McClelland, Goodchild, and Stewart, 1914.
Ward, Mary Augusta. Delia Blanchflower. Ward, Lock, 1915.
Ward, Mary Augusta. Diana Mallory. Smith, Elder, 1908.
Ward, Mary Augusta, and Albert Sterner. Eleanor. Smith, Elder, 1900.
Ward, Mary Augusta. England’s Effort. Smith, Elder, 1916.
Ward, Mary Augusta, and Albert Sterner. Fenwick’s Career. Smith, Elder, 1906.
Ward, Mary Augusta. Fields of Victory. Hutchinson, 1919.
Ward, Mary Augusta. Harvest. W. Collins, 1920.
Ward, Mary Augusta. Helbeck of Bannisdale. Smith, Elder, 1898.
Ward, Mary Augusta. Helbeck of Bannisdale. Editor Worthington, Brian, Penguin, 1983.
Watters, Tamie, and Mary Augusta Ward. “Introduction”. Marcella, Virago, 1984, p. vii - xvi.
Ward, Mary Augusta. “Introduction”. Robert Elsmere, edited by Rosemary Ashton, Oxford University Press, 1987, p. vii - xviii.
Ward, Mary Augusta. “Introduction and Notes”. Helbeck of Bannisdale, edited by Brian Worthington, Penguin, 1983, pp. 9 - 27, 391.
Ward, Mary Augusta. Lady Connie. Smith, Elder, 1916.
Ward, Mary Augusta, and Albert Sterner. Lady Connie. Hearst’s International Library, 1916.
Ward, Mary Augusta, and Arthur I. Keller. Lady Merton, Colonist. Musson Book Company, 1910.
Ward, Mary Augusta, and Howard Chandler Christy. Lady Rose’s Daughter. Harper and Brothers, 1903.