Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present
Jane Porter
-
Standard Name: Porter, Jane
Birth Name: Jane Porter
JP
was largely an early nineteenth-century author: though she reached print before the end of the previous century, she let her younger and more prolific sister get the start of her in publishing. She wrote plays, poems, and diaries, and edited Sir Philip Sidney
, but she began with and is best known for her pioneering of the historical novel.
Maurice grows up and grows handsome. On later visits he performs a dangerous and heroic rescue of a local girl from the path of a train, and takes Nora out hunting: a more adult mode...
Leisure and Society
Maria Susanna Cooper
MSC
kept up with contemporary publications. She asked her son Astley to send her from London the latest volume of Johnson
's edition of Shakespeare
Cooper, Bransby Blake. The Life of Sir Astley Cooper, Bart. John W. Parker.
MB
's first heroine, Laura Montreville, daughter of a Scottish officer, covets Christian martyrdom as a child, in rather the same spirit as George Eliot
's Dorothea Brooke and other idealistic, immature heroines. As a...
Publishing
Amelia Bristow
A list of about 210 subscribers is given in the volume. They included Hannah More
and Jane
and Anna Maria Porter
. A sixth edition appeared in 1847.
Loeber, Rolf, and Magda Loeber. A Guide to Irish Fiction 1650-1900. Four Courts.
180
Garside, Peter et al., editors. The English Novel 1770-1829. Oxford University Press.
2: 660
The full title is...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text
E. Owens Blackburne
The scope of Illustrious Irishwomen is broad, beginning with half-legendary
Blackburne, E. Owens. Illustrious Irishwomen. Tinsley Brothers.
Having already praised many contemporary women writers in print, EOB
was now able to meet them. The move to London was accomplished principally through the zealous friendship of Miss Sarah Wesley
, who had already...
On 11 May 1812 Henry Crabb Robinson
recorded in his diary meeting JB
and other women writers on a visit to Miss Benjers (Elizabeth Ogilvy Benger
). In his account of this pleasant evening...
Textual Features
Joanna Baillie
JB
said she admired her heroine Lady Grisell
(whose story she wrote in a few weeks during the winter of 1816-17) beyond any Female Character I ever knew or read of.
Baillie, Joanna. The Collected Letters of Joanna Baillie. Editor Slagle, Judith Bailey, Fairleigh Dickinson University Press.
1: 168
She acknowledged...
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...
