Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present
Mary Lamb
-
Standard Name: Lamb, Mary,, 1764 - 1847
Birth Name: Mary Anne Lamb
Nickname: Polly
Pseudonym: Sempronia
Used Form: Mary Anne Lamb
ML
is still known primarily as the sister of the essayist Charles Lamb
, and as the central character in a painful and sensational story. She was, however, the lead author in her three collaborations with Charles (Lamb's Tales from Shakespeare, 1807, Mrs Leicester's School, 1808, and a book of verses for children) and sole author of a strongly feminist essay.
While serving his sentence in the Surrey Gaol in Horsemonger Lane (missing his family and ill with lung disease caused by confinement), LH
received as visitors Maria Edgeworth
, William Hazlitt
, Jeremy Bentham
,...
MCC
's parents frequently entertained eminent literary figures in a drawing-room where the paintings were all executed by distinguished friends. At an early age she became acquainted with Charles
and Mary Lamb
, Leigh Hunt
Health
Priscilla Wakefield
A report into abuses at a private madhouse at Hoxton, John Mitford
's Description of the Crimes and Horrors, 1825, describes the fate of a Mrs. Wakefield, the authoress of many good books...
Health
Mary Matilda Betham
MMB
had some kind of general breakdown of health whose beginning Ernest Betham dates to about 1818 (though she seems to have been well when her Vignettes: in Verse appeared this year). Robert Southey
reported...
Instructor
Mary Cowden Clarke
While her brother Alfred
had a year at school in France, she was taught Latin and poetical reading by Mary Lamb
, whose voice years later remain[ed] on my mind's ear.
Clarke, Mary Cowden. My Long Life. Dodd, Mead.
22
Literary responses
Evelyn Sharp
Beverly Lyon Clark
, who wrote an introduction to this book and thought extremely highly of it, argued that the neglect of it stemmed from its belonging not just to one but to several under-appreciated...
Occupation
Mary Matilda Betham
MMB
wrote later that many people thought her a singular, and perhaps imprudent person, because I rhymed, and ventured into the world as an artist; but I belonged to a large family, and dreaded dependence...
Occupation
William Godwin
The imprint M. J. Godwin and Company was launched the following year. The business flourished, becoming almost a literary salon like that of Joseph Johnson
: visitors included Germaine de Staël
. It remained, however...
Residence
Eliza Fenwick
Presumably during the course of this move, the Fenwick family (including the dog) arrived to stay for a week at the home of Charles
and Mary Lamb
, being apparently homeless.
Burton, Sarah. A Double Life: A Biography of Charles and Mary Lamb. Viking.
265
Mary Lamb, who...
Textual Features
Charlotte Yonge
CM's preface (dated March 1870) says that as a child she preferred the inherited books of the former generation to any moderns except Maria Edgeworth
.
Yonge, Charlotte, editor. A Storehouse of Stories. Macmillan.
Early in the play the heroine, Miss Beaufort, makes a splendidly flowing and imaginative speech about the endurance necessary to wives; nevertheless she achieves marriage to Fitzaubin, the sceptical and philosophic hero. She also mentions...
Textual Production
Mary Matilda Betham
In March 1799 MMB
was apparently working both at some translation (which she suspected would not sell) and a novel. Neither has been identified or is known to have been printed.
Betham, Ernest, editor. A House of Letters. Jarrold and Sons.
This by no means exhausts the list of EN
's writings for children. The first number of The Enchanted Castle (which is less episodic, perhaps less brilliant, and more socially critical than the Phoenix or...
