Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present
Sir Walter Scott
-
Standard Name: Scott, Sir Walter
Birth Name: Walter Scott
Titled: Sir Walter Scott
Nickname: The Great Unknown
Used Form: author of Kenilworth
The remarkable career of Walter Scott
began with a period as a Romantic poet (the leading Romantic poet in terms of popularity) before he went on to achieve even greater popularity as a novelist, particularly for his historical fiction and Scottish national tales. His well-earned fame in both these genres of fiction has tended to create the impression that he originated them, whereas in fact women novelists had preceded him in each.
AS
, Poetical Works, was posthumously published, edited at her express desire by Walter Scott
(at this date a famous poet but not yet a novelist).
Critical Review. W. Simpkin and R. Marshall.
3d ser. 20 (1810): 448
Textual Production
Anna Seward
AS
wrote her first surviving letter to the young Walter Scott
, with a detailed critique of his Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, of which he had sent her the first volume (not the...
Textual Production
Anna Seward
AS
's six-volume Letters . . . written between the years 1784 and 1807 were posthumously published: not edited by Scott
(as she had requested).
Critical Review. W. Simpkin and R. Marshall.
3d ser. 23 (1811): 112
Friends, Associates
Anna Seward
In her last years AS
availed herself of the services of a Miss Fern
as a (presumably paid) companion.
Ashmun, Margaret. The Singing Swan. Yale University Press; H. Milford, Oxford University Press.
244-6
She had struck up an acquaintance with the young Walter Scott
(who sent some of...
Literary responses
Anna Seward
The Horatian odes received in London literary circles such warm approbation that the poet could not listen with undelighted ears.
Ashmun, Margaret. The Singing Swan. Yale University Press; H. Milford, Oxford University Press.
145
Walter Scott
however, despite the invocation of Dryden and Pope, argued that as paraphrase...
Publishing
Anna Seward
AS
had been in some kind of publishing negotiation with Constable
of Edinburgh for several years. Archibald Constable
visited her in April 1807. After this he consulted John Murray
in London, who advised him against...
Literary responses
Anna Seward
Scott
in his introduction gave a vivid description of AS
's good looks (even in old age), especially the poetical attributes of dark, flashing eyes and a melodious voice.
Ashmun, Margaret. The Singing Swan. Yale University Press; H. Milford, Oxford University Press.
253-4
The Critical Review said that...
Textual Production
Anna Seward
Late in life she edited a juvenile journal, which however Walter Scott
chose not to print.
Barnard, Teresa. Oral communication with Isobel Grundy.
Literary responses
Anna Seward
Scott
confided to Joanna Baillie
after AS
's death that he had developed a most unsentimental horror for her sentimental letters while he was receiving them.
Ashmun, Margaret. The Singing Swan. Yale University Press; H. Milford, Oxford University Press.
At the age of fifteen she ceased regular study, and began reading on her own. She spent much of the time at Friends
' meetings going over passages from Byron
, Southey
, Moore
...
Friends, Associates
Mary Martha Sherwood
Meeting the prison reformer Elizabeth Fry
, MMS
discussed with her the danger of celebrity, for females especially, and their respective temptations.
Sherwood, Mary Martha, and Henry Sherwood. The Life of Mrs. Sherwood. Editor Kelly, Sophia, Darton.
The diary provides a full and vivid account of girlhood in the years leading up to Victoria
's reign, in addition to musings on familial and personal topics. It contains substantial literary criticism, such as...
Marsh, Jan, and Pamela Gerrish Nunn. Women Artists and the Pre-Raphaelite Movement. Virago.
66
Occupation
Elizabeth Siddal
After this show, Siddal's illustration of Scott
's Clerk Saunders was part of an exhibition that toured the United States; beyond these two instances, her work was never exhibited in her lifetime. Charles Eliot Norton
Reception
Elizabeth Siddal
He also nicknamed her Ida after Tennyson
's heroine in The Princess, and compared her pride to that of Scott
's Flora MacIvor.
Marsh, Jan. Elizabeth Siddal, 1829-1862: Pre-Raphaelite Artist. The Ruskin Gallery.
