Anna Seward

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Standard Name: Seward, Anna
Birth Name: Anna Seward
Nickname: The Swan of Lichfield
Nickname: Nancy
AS , living at a distance from London, was nevertheless a woman of letters, of the later eighteenth century and just beyond. She staked her claim to fame firstly on her poetry (though she was always willing to try genres unusual to her, like sermons and a biography of Erasmus Darwin ), secondly on her letters. In these and in her newspaper contributions she was also a literary critic, familiar with the criteria of both the Augustan and Romantic eras and gifted besides with an unfailing independence of judgement.
Photograph of a painting of Anna Seward by Tilly Kettle, 1762. Seward is seated at a desk with a little book of Milton's poetry in front of her. She is wearing a white gauzy bodice with wide sleeves, a deep pink mantle edged with brown fur, and a black ribbon and a string of pearls as a choker around her neck. Her dark hair is pinned on top of her head with a pearl ornament. National Portrait Gallery.

Connections

Connections Author name Excerpt
Literary responses Ann Yearsley
Again one of Yearsley's most perceptive readers was Anna Seward , who wrote to Helen Maria Williams on Christmas Day 1787 that Yearsley and Burns were both miracles . . . . Perhaps she has...
Literary responses Ann Yearsley
More and Elizabeth Montagu admired AY as a primitive, untrained writer whose excellence came from nature, not from carefully nurtured ability: as a phenomenon verging on a freak. More's Prefatory Letter to Yearsley's Poems, on...
Textual Production Virginia Woolf
By 1912 VW had published on Margaret Cavendish (as Duchess of Newcastle), Ann, Lady Fanshawe , Elizabeth Carter , Anna Seward , Elizabeth, Lady Holland , Maria Edgeworth , Lady Hester Stanhope , theBrontë
Friends, Associates Elizabeth Pipe Wolferstan
Samuel Pipe Wolferstan"s friends included Erasmus Darwin , Anna Seward , Thomas Gisborne , and the novelist Robert Bage . Of EPW 's own friends, Mary Gresley was seriously pursued by her husband before he married Elizabeth.
Wolferstan, Elizabeth Pipe. “Preface”. Agatha, edited by John Goss.
forthcoming
Publishing Helen Maria Williams
HMW published her Poem on the Bill Lately Passed for Regulating the Slave Trade. (The bill was that of Sir William Dolben .) She sent a copies of her poem to Robert Burns (who...
Friends, Associates Helen Maria Williams
There she began to frequent Elizabeth Montagu 's bluestocking circle. She was introduced in cultural circles by Andrew Kippis , minister of the church her family attended, and soon knew William Hayley , Sarah Siddons
Literary responses Helen Maria Williams
The Critical's notice was long and positive. Elizabeth Gilding praised HMW 's Peru in a poem which the Gentleman's Magazine published in July, and Anna Seward in a poem which appeared the next year...
Publishing Helen Maria Williams
The Poems were in two volumes, with HMW 's name in full, published by Rivington and Marshall , with an engraved frontispiece drawn by Maria Cosway . Subscribers included the Prince of Wales (whose name...
Publishing Helen Maria Williams
It appeared in two volumes from Cadell . It was advertised in March, and in April Williams sent a copy to Anna Seward .
Garside, Peter et al., editors. The English Novel 1770-1829. Oxford University Press.
1: 519
Michael-Johnston, Georgina. Helen Maria Williams: Liberty, Sensibility, and Education. University of Alberta.
149, 156
A prefatory Advertisement says that her materials...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Jane West
JW includes some juvenile work in this collection (a poem on Easter and another, written at her mother's request, beginning Thou sweet composer of earth-nurtur'd care, Sweet Poesy!
Feminist Companion Archive.
), and a piece reprinted from a...
Textual Features Susanna Watts
Ephemera of all kinds have been bound in: family anecdotes, a letter of William Cowper of 1788, a Hindu Primer (or alphabet), a railway ticket of 1839, women's parliamentary petitions against slavery of 1833 (one...
Textual Production Eglinton Wallace
It appeared in two different editions put out this year through the different publishers T. Hookham , and Debrett . The Debrett edition lists the price, one shilling and sixpence, on the title-page.
“Eighteenth Century Collections Online”. Gale Databases.
Goethe's novel...
Friends, Associates Melesina Trench
In England and (especially) Ireland her friends (with whom she kept up largely by correspondence) included a number of other amateur writers: Mary Leadbeater (from 1802), Lady Eleanor Butler and Sarah Ponsonby (the Ladies of...
Literary responses Melesina Trench
One of those the few who noticed and admired her poetry was Anna Seward .
Kittredge, Katharine. “Melesina Chenevix St. John Trench (1768-1827)”. The Female Spectator (1995-), Vol.
10
, No. 2, pp. 4-6.
5
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Melesina Trench
About the first twenty pages are occupied by MT 's early reminiscences, probably written not long after her first husband's death: she frankly recorded her emotional disturbance over that event.
Trench, Melesina. The Remains of the Late Mrs. Richard Trench. Editor Trench, Richard Chenevix, Parker and Bourn.
18
Later pages mix letters...

Timeline

1770: The Lichfield Circle began to develop at...

Building item

1770

The Lichfield Circle began to develop at Lichfield in Staffordshire; the group advocated reform of women's education away from time-filling accomplishments such as japanning and toward intellectual learning.

16 December 1773: Citizens dumped 340 chests of tea into the...

National or international item

16 December 1773

Citizens dumped 340 chests of tea into the harbour at Boston, Massachusetts, to protest duty imposed by the Tea Act of 10 May; this became known as the Boston Tea Party.

1782: George Romney painted a picture to illustrate...

Women writers item

1782

George Romney painted a picture to illustrate (after the fact) William Hayley 'a Triumphs of Temper, 1781: Serena, reading Burney 's Evelina. The model was Honora Sneyd .

1785: William Hayley published his Philosophical,...

Writing climate item

1785

William Hayley published his Philosophical, Historical and Moral Essay on Old Maids; most women readers agreed with Anna Seward that the book displayed witty, but ungenerous sport of fancy.
Seward, Anna. Letters of Anna Seward. Editor Constable, Archibald, Vol.
6 vols.
, A. Constable.
I: 147

April 1789: The Gentleman's Magazine published Anna Seward's...

Women writers item

April 1789

The Gentleman's Magazine published Anna Seward 's selection of living celebrated Female Poets.

By June 1796: Samuel Taylor Coleridge compiled a booklet...

Writing climate item

By June 1796

Samuel Taylor Coleridge compiled a booklet titled Sonnets from Various Authors: four each by himself, Southey , Charles Lamb , and Charles Lloyd , two by Charlotte Smith , and one each by seven more writers including Anna Seward .

1801: Philip James de Loutherbourg painted Coalbrookdale...

Building item

1801

Philip James de Loutherbourg painted Coalbrookdale by Night, a theatrically romantic picture of a famous industrial village: houses perched on the valley cliffs, with a clouded sky glaring red from furnaces.

December 1802: The Critical Review extolled the quality...

Women writers item

December 1802

The Critical Review extolled the quality of contemporary women's poetry: Miss Seward , Mrs Barbauld , Charlotte Smith , will take their place among the English poets for centuries to come.

1804: The publisher George, George, and John Robinson,...

Writing climate item

1804

The publisher George, George, and John Robinson , whose list of women writers had been distinguished, went bankrupt.

9 June 1819: The library of the late Queen Charlotte was...

Building item

9 June 1819

The library of the late Queen Charlotte was auctioned by Christie's ; it included Jane Austen 's works, plus titles by Catherine Cuthbertson , Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire , Christian Isobel Johnstone , Alethea Lewis

Texts

Seward, Anna. Anna Seward’s Journal and Sermons. Editor Barnard, Teresa, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2017.
Seward, Anna. Blindness. J. Montgomery, 1806.
Seward, Anna. Elegy on Captain Cook. J. Dodsley, 1780.
Seward, Anna. Letters of Anna Seward. Editor Constable, Archibald, Vol.
6 vols.
, A. Constable, 1811.
Seward, Anna. Llangollen Vale, with Other Poems. G. Sael, 1796.
Seward, Anna. Louisa. J. Jackson and G. Robinson, 1784.
Seward, Anna et al. “Memoirs of Abelard and Eloisa”. Letters of Abelard and Eloisa, translated by. John Hughes and John Hughes, J. Mitchell, 1805.
Seward, Anna. Memoirs of the Life of Dr. Darwin. J. Johnson, 1804.
Seward, Anna. Monody on Major André. Printed and sold by J. Jackson, for the author, 1781.
Seward, Anna. Original Sonnets on various Subjects and Odes paraphrased from Horace. G. Sael, 1799.
Seward, Anna, and Wally Chamberlain Oulton. The Beauties of Anna Seward. C. Chapple, 1813.
Seward, Anna. The Poetical Works of Anna Seward. Editor Scott, Sir Walter, J. Ballantyne, 1810.