Rachel Speght

03 August 1596 - 01 April 1661

RS stands out among authors of polemic answers to Joseph Swetnam's offensive misogynist pamphlet of 1615. Her editor Barbara Kiefer Lewalski observes that she is the first Englishwoman to identify herself solidly by name (granted that there must be some doubt about the genuine identity of Jane Anger ) in contributing to the gender controversy known as the querelle des femmes.

Lewalski, Barbara Kiefer, and Rachel Speght. “Introduction”. The Polemics and Poems of Rachel Speght, Oxford University Press, p. xi - xxxvi.

Her known writings comprise two poems, allegorical and devotional (the earlier one being her intervention in polemical debate), and two petitions of much later date.

Milestones

Between August 3, 1596 and August 2, 1597

RS was born, perhaps in Cambridge, since there is no record of her birth in London.

McLean-Fiander, Kimberly R. D. A Critical Edition of Rachel Speght’s Mortalities Memorandum. University of Alberta.

7, 10

Lewalski, Barbara Kiefer, and Rachel Speght. “Introduction”. The Polemics and Poems of Rachel Speght, Oxford University Press, p. xi - xxxvi.

14 November 1616

RS 's A Mouzell for Melastomus (a polemical reply to Joseph Swetnam 's Araignment of Lewde, idle, froward [sic], and unconstant Women, 1615) was listed in the Stationers' Register .

Lewalski, Barbara Kiefer, and Rachel Speght. “Introduction”. The Polemics and Poems of Rachel Speght, Oxford University Press, p. xi - xxxvi.

xii

1617

RS 's A Mouzell for Melastomus (i.e. for Joseph Swetnam ) is dated this year, though it may have appeared before the end of 1616.

Lewalski, Barbara Kiefer, and Rachel Speght. “Introduction”. The Polemics and Poems of Rachel Speght, Oxford University Press, p. xi - xxxvi.

xxxii

18 January 1621

RS entered in the Stationers' RegisterMortalities Memorandum, with a Dreame Prefixed, Imaginarie in Manner; Reall in Matter.

Lewalski, Barbara Kiefer, and Rachel Speght. “Introduction”. The Polemics and Poems of Rachel Speght, Oxford University Press, p. xi - xxxvi.

xii

March 1647

Rachel Procter (formerly RS ) submitted a second petition, requesting that the man who had taken over her husband 's forfeited benefice should be liable for the excise payments on it.

Speight, Helen. “Rachel Speght’s Polemical Life”. Huntington Library Quarterly, Vol.

, No. 3/4, pp. 449-63.

460

Biography

Birth and Family

Between August 3, 1596 and August 2, 1597

RS was born, perhaps in Cambridge, since there is no record of her birth in London.

McLean-Fiander, Kimberly R. D. A Critical Edition of Rachel Speght’s Mortalities Memorandum. University of Alberta.

7, 10

Lewalski, Barbara Kiefer, and Rachel Speght. “Introduction”. The Polemics and Poems of Rachel Speght, Oxford University Press, p. xi - xxxvi.