Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present
L. E. L.
-
Standard Name: L. E. L.
Birth Name: Letitia Elizabeth Landon
Pseudonym: L.
Pseudonym: L. E. L.
Used Form: LEL
Used Form: L.E.L.
LEL was one of the most prolific and popular authors of her day. She produced an immense corpus of poetry, several works of fiction (the first a particularly striking silver fork novel), and considerable review and editorial work. Her work more than any other popularized the persona of the lovelorn, doomed poetess in the early nineteenth century.
But though she lived remote from London, she corresponded with writers such as L. E. L.
and Jane Welsh Carlyle
.
Devey, Louisa. Life of Rosina, Lady Lytton. Second, Swan Sonnenschein, Lowery, 1887, http://U. of Toronto.
143
Blain, Virginia. “Rosina Bulwer Lytton and the Rage of the Unheard”. The Huntington Library Quarterly, Vol.
53
, No. 3, 1 June 1990– 2025, pp. 210-36.
232-3
Her women friends stood by her during her husband's various persecutions.
Fictionalization
Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
For centuries LMWM
has been interpreted and re-interpreted, judged less often as writer than as an exemplar of the unacceptable female. Her fame and/or notoriety flourished during her lifetime, and posthumous publications kept it alive...
Family and Intimate relationships
John Forster
In 1834 JF
became engaged to the popular poet L.E.L
. Their nuptials were soon called off by L.E.L when rumours that she had had an affair with William Jerdan
resurfaced. Forster pressed for a...
Family and Intimate relationships
Anna Eliza Bray
Ann Arrow Kempe
was described by her daughter as shy and tender, with a love of music. L. E. L.
remembered her as a charming, kind woman who admired poetry and demonstrated a sincere affection...
Family and Intimate relationships
Violet Fane
VF
's love life was a frequent subject of London gossip. According to the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, she was regarded, in her own time, as a late-Victorian Letitia Landon
.
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
Apart from...
Education
Frances Ridley Havergal
FRH
was an avid reader within limits: her selection of material was mostly dictated by her religious interests. After receiving a copy of a book about literary women she commented, The sad sketch of L. E. L.
Dedications
Emma Roberts
This work she dedicated to L. E. L.
, as a faint tribute to her genius.
qtd. in
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, 1990.
It was reprinted in London two years later, with the final three words dropped from the title.
Dedications
Maria Jane Jewsbury
In the Drawing-Room Scrapbook for 1839 MJJ
published a poem to the annual's former editor: To L.E.L
after meeting her for the first time.
Boyle, Andrew. An Index to the Annuals. Andrew Boyle, 1967.
154
Anthologization
Barbara Hofland
BH
seems to have remained saleable for a long time, since The Gift of Friendship . . . with contributions by . . . Mrs. Hofland appeared as late as 1877. Others included were Mary Howitt
