Eliza Meteyard

21 June 1816 - 04 April 1879

EM , who used the pseudonym Silverpen, was a self-supporting early Victorian writer who published prolifically in a wide range of periodicals, particularly those aimed at the lower-middle and working classes, in addition to writing three novels for adults and a number of more successful stories for children. Her work suffered from the pressure to earn, but her journalism in particular is nevertheless powerful in its treatment of the economic and social ills of women. EM is best remembered now for her standard biography of the industrial potter and captain of industry Josiah Wedgwood . Some of her work was never published.

Allibone, S. Austin, editor. A Critical Dictionary of English Literature and British and American Authors Living and Deceased. Gale Research.

Lightbown, Ronald W., and Eliza Meteyard. “Introduction”. The Life of Josiah Wedgwood, Cornmarket Press.

Milestones

21 June 1816

EM was born in Lime Street, Liverpool, the only girl in a family of six children.

Allibone wrongly dates her birth as 1822.

Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.

Blain, Virginia et al., editors. The Feminist Companion to Literature in English: Women Writers from the Middle Ages to the Present. Yale University Press; Batsford.

4 April 1879

EM died at South Lambeth (then reckoned to be in Surrey rather than part of London).

Stephen, Sir Leslie, and Sidney Lee, editors. The Dictionary of National Biography. Smith, Elder.

Biography

Birth and Family

21 June 1816

EM was born in Lime Street, Liverpool, the only girl in a family of six children.

Allibone wrongly dates her birth as 1822.

Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.

Blain, Virginia et al., editors. The Feminist Companion to Literature in English: Women Writers from the Middle Ages to the Present. Yale University Press; Batsford.