Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present
Mary, Lady Champion de Crespigny
-
Standard Name: Champion de Crespigny, Mary,,, Lady
Birth Name: Mary Clarke
Married Name: Mary Champion de Crespigny
Pseudonym: MCC
Self-constructed Name: Mary Champion Crespigny
Titled: Lady Mary Champion de Crespigny
MLCC
used her exalted social position as a patron of writers, especially women writers. She was a habitual diarist (though little of her diary survives) and a writer of occasional poetry—for manuscript circulation, or inscription on landscape features, and at least once for print. She chose print for two longer works: a novel and a conduct-book, 1803, made up of letters addressed to her teenage son in about 1780.
It was EOB
's uncle by marriage Sir David Ogilvy
who introduced her to Mary Champion de Crespigny
, dedicatee of The Female Geniad.
This information was privately supplied by scholar Jan Fergus
.
Dedications
Elizabeth Ogilvy Benger
She wrote it before the death of Catharine Macaulay
, though it appeared afterwards. Lucy Aikin
said she wrote it at about fifteen, which exaggerates her youth by only a year.
The Monthly Repository. Longman, Hurst, Rees and Orme.
1 n.s., 1827.126
Her...
Publishing
Mary Deverell
Her full title was Miscellanies in Prose and Verse, mostly written in the Epistolary Style, chiefly upon Moral Subjects, And particularly calculated for the Improvement of Younger Minds. It was published in two volumes...
On 17 April 1790 AML
went to Mary Champion de Crespigny
's private theatre and saw a performance of Mariana Starke
's tragedy The British Orphans. She was at the theatre (a public one...
Dedications
Eliza Parsons
EP
's two-act comedy The Intrigues of a Morning (adapted from Molière
's Monsieur de Pourclaugnac) was produced at Covent Garden
. It was printed the same year, dedicated to Mary Champion de Crespigny
.
The London Stage 1660-1800. Southern Illinois University Press.
Solo: Search Oxford University Libraries Online. http://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/primo_library/libweb/action/search.do?vid=OXVU1&fromLogin=true&reset_config=true.
Publishing
Eliza Parsons
She gave her name as Mrs. Parsons on the title-page and signed the dedication with both her names.
Garside, Peter et al., editors. The English Novel 1770-1829. Oxford University Press.
1: 512
A title-page epigraph reads: Brutus said Virtue was but a name—tis more. ....
Dedications
Eliza Parsons
It was in press in late October;
Garside, Peter et al., editors. The English Novel 1770-1829. Oxford University Press.
1: 593
EP
wrote its dedication to Mrs Crespigny
, who first encouraged me to commit them to the Public, on 12 November.
Parsons, Eliza. Ellen and Julia. William Lane.
1: prelims
In a humble...
Dedications
Anna Maria Porter
AMP
published, with her name, her second novel, Octavia, dedicated to Mary Champion de Crespigny
.
Garside, Peter et al., editors. The English Novel 1770-1829. Oxford University Press.
1: 758
Critical Review. W. Simpkin and R. Marshall.
2d ser. 24 (1798): 471
Friends, Associates
Jane Porter
JP
was also a friend of Mary Robinson
—actress, poet, and novelist—but this friendship was threatened by Robinson's position outside respectable society. When Robinson published some lines about JP
in a newspaper, Mary Champion de Crespigny
Textual Production
Jane Porter
In 1800 appeared a pamphlet essay which may be by JP
or to her and her sister
: A Defence of the Profession of an Actor.
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
Stuart Bennett Rare Books & Manuscripts: A Catalogue of Books By, For, and About Women of the British Isles, 1696-1892. Stuart Bennett Rare Books & Manuscripts.
The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography and Thomas McLean
Friends, Associates
Mary Robinson
After MR
became known as the prince's mistress, the double standard in public morality made it virtually impossible for respectable women to treat her as a friend. Her admiration for Sarah Siddons
was not reciprocated...
Performance of text
Mariana Starke
A lost tragedy by MS
entitled The British Orphans was performed at Mary Champion de Crespigny
's private theatre in Camberwell near London.
From at least the late 1770s MS
and her family were on terms of close friendship with Eliza
and William Hayley
; Mariana's earliest extant letter to Eliza Hayley is dated 22 December 1780. William...
Dedications
Mariana Starke
MS
made some use of a play by Antoine Marin Le Mierre
, La veuve du Malabar. In her version the censor compelled some changes, like watering down the word hell-born (used of suttee)...
Timeline
By 22 July 1797: William Beckford published a second and more...
Women writers item
By 22 July 1797
William Beckford
published a second and more marked burlesque attack on women's writing: Azemia: A Descriptive and Sentimental Novel. Interspersed with Pieces of Poetry.
Texts
Mary, Lady Champion de Crespigny,. A Monody to the Memory of the Right Honourable the Lord Collingwood. Cadell and Davis, 1810.
Mary, Lady Champion de Crespigny,. Letters of Advice from a Mother to her Son. Cadell and Davies, 1803.
Mary, Lady Champion de Crespigny,. The Pavilion. William Lane, Minerva Press, 1796.