Anna Brownell Jameson

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Standard Name: Jameson, Anna Brownell
Birth Name: Anna Brownell Murphy
Nickname: Nina
Married Name: Anna Brownell Jameson
Indexed Name: Anna Brownwell Murphy
ABJ , a prolific and professional writer of non-fiction, is best remembered for her travel writing, her treatises on art, and her provocative studies of fictional and famous women. In England she is noted for her feminist criticism and biography, and for her support of the younger set of writers and activists who founded the English Woman's Journal. In Canadian literary history she is remembered primarily for her forward-looking, feminist travel narrative Winter Studies and Summer Rambles in Canada. Critics are just beginning to take stock of the achievements and influence of one of the foremost women of letters in early Victorian England.
Mermin, Dorothy. Godiva’s Ride: Women of Letters in England 1830-1880. Indiana University Press.
xiii
Sepia-toned photograph of Anna Brownell Jameson, standing with her elbow resting on a book that sits atop a small cloth-draped table. She wears a light dress with white lace trim around the neck, a second layer over the shoulders, apparently a built-in shawl trimmed with dark gauzy cloth. A long, dark, gauzy scarf is draped behind her and over her arms. Her dark curly hair is topped by a bonnet of light and dark ribbons. In one hand she holds a small pair of spectacles.

Connections

Connections Author name Excerpt
Friends, Associates Anna Swanwick
Other friends mentioned by her niece and biographer were Fredrika Bremer , Anna Brownell Jameson , Frances Power Cobbe , Thomas Carlyle , George MacDonald , Lady Eastlake , Elizabeth Rundle Charles , Lady Martin
Literary responses Anna Swanwick
Anna Brownell Jameson praised this work as an achievement few women had equalled.
Bruce, Mary Louisa. Anna Swanwick, A Memoir and Recollections 1813-1899. T. F. Unwin.
40-1
A supplementary volume of the Dictionary of National Biography called AS 's Goethe translation accurate and spirited . . . one...
Textual Production Agnes Strickland
Even before settling in London, AS began her professional authorial career with tales for children, many published in The Parting Gift, of which she was at that time the editor.
Pope-Hennessy, Una. Agnes Strickland: Biographer of the Queens of England. Chatto and Windus.
22
She published...
Travel Harriet Beecher Stowe
She was received by Dickens , Lady Byron , Anna Jameson , the Lord Mayor of London, and various members of the nobility.
Hedrick, Joan. Harriet Beecher Stowe: A Life. Oxford University Press.
233, 234
Adams, John R. Harriet Beecher Stowe. Twayne.
44-5
The working-class Scots poet Janet Hamilton 's tribute to...
Textual Production Harriet Beecher Stowe
Though HBS was internationally recognized for her written works she was not, unlike many other contemporary literary figures, a frequent lecturer. While Dickens , Samuel Clemens (who published as Mark Twain), Julia Ward Howe ...
Intertextuality and Influence Harriet Beecher Stowe
HBS is remembered above all as having contributed substantially with Uncle Tom's Cabin to the build-up of anti-slavery feeling in the North before the Civil War. The sense of her influence is encapsulated in the...
Intertextuality and Influence Germaine de Staël
After completing this novel GS wrote, I'd like a really big [writing] table, it seems to me I've got the right to it now.
Kobak, Annette. “Mme de Staël and Fanny Burney”. The Burney Journal, Vol.
4
, pp. 12-35.
19
Corinne was enormously influential for nineteenth-century women writers. The model...
Friends, Associates Catharine Maria Sedgwick
Closest to CMS were her siblings and their spouses, several of whom were also published authors. The Sedgwick family and Fanny Kemble were apparently the inner circle of the literary scene in the Berkshires,...
Friends, Associates Elizabeth Rigby
While in London, ER renewed old friendships and established new. She socialized with Sir Edwin Henry Landseer , John Wilson Croker , Henry Chorley , Lord Lansdowne , and Anna Jameson (with whom she corresponded)...
Occupation Elizabeth Rigby
The following year, while ER was busy completing Anna Jameson 's The History of Our Lord as Exemplified in Works of Art, her numerous engagements made it difficult for her to balance her social...
Textual Production Elizabeth Rigby
In March 1864 ER published The History of Our Lord as Exemplified in Works of Art, by herself and Anna Brownell Jameson , in two volumes. Most of the actual writing in the book...
politics Marion Reid
In June 1840, MR attended the General Anti-Slavery Convention in London, together with Anna Brownell Jameson , Amelia Opie , and Lady Byron . She was the only Scotswoman present.
Johnston, Judith. Anna Jameson: Victorian, Feminist, Woman of Letters. Scolar Press.
xii
Ewan, Elizabeth et al. The Biographical Dictionary of Scottish Women : From the Earliest Times to 2004. Edinburgh University Press.
MR was shocked...
Literary responses Marion Reid
Scholar Margaret McFadden notes that this work was tremendously successful, particularly in the United States, where it went through five editions between 1847 and 1852. The 1847 edition and all ensuing versions were printed...
Health Adelaide Procter
AP 's health was poor from an early age. A letter from William Thackeray describes her at the age of fourteen as vomiting basins of blood. She went to Italy for a year in 1853-54...
politics Adelaide Procter
Earlier in the year, the National Association for the Promotion of Social Science had appointed AP as member of a committee to consider ways of providing employment opportunities for women. It was an appointment that...

Timeline

1826: William Saunders and Edward John Otley established...

Writing climate item

1826

William Saunders and Edward John Otley established themselves as the lending-library and bookselling firm of Saunders and Otley at 50 Conduit Street, London.

December 1855: Barbara Leigh Smith, later Bodichon, founded...

National or international item

December 1855

Barbara Leigh Smith , later Bodichon, founded the Married Women's Property Committee (sometimes called the Women's Committee) to draw up a petition for a married women's property bill.

14 March 1856: A petition for Reform of the Married Women's...

National or international item

14 March 1856

A petitionfor Reform of the Married Women's Property Law, organized by the Married Women's Property Committee and signed by many prominent women, was presented to both Houses of Parliament.

May 1856: J. W. Kaye published anonymously Outrages...

Women writers item

May 1856

J. W. Kaye published anonymously Outrages on Women, a ground-breaking consideration of wife assault, in the North British Review.

2 May 1857: A grand dome designed by Panizzi was opened...

Building item

2 May 1857

A grand dome designed by Panizzi was opened in what had been the central courtyard of the British Museum .

1858: Louisa Twining became secretary of the newly-founded...

National or international item

1858

Louisa Twining became secretary of the newly-founded Workhouse Visiting Society .

March 1858: The English Woman's Journal, a monthly magazine...

Women writers item

March 1858

The English Woman's Journal, a monthly magazine on the theory and practice of organised feminism, began publication in London, with financial support from Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon and others, under the editorship of...

7 July 1859: The first meeting of the Society for Promoting...

Building item

7 July 1859

The first meeting of the Society for Promoting the Employment of Women was held in London; founding members included Anna Jameson , Emily Faithfull , Jessie Boucherett , Adelaide Procter , Bessie Rayner Parkes , Isa Craig , and Sarah Lewin .

August 1864: The English Woman's Journal, a practical...

Building item

August 1864

The English Woman's Journal, a practical and theoretical source of organized feminism from London, merged into The Alexandra Magazine and English Woman's Journal.

April 1879: James Murray—editor since 1 March of what...

Writing climate item

April 1879

James Murray —editor since 1 March of what was to become the Oxford English Dictionary—issued an Appeal for readers to supply illustrative quotations.

18 August 1882: The Married Women's Property Act gave women...

National or international item

18 August 1882

The Married Women's Property Act gave women the right to all the property they earned or acquired before or during marriage.

Texts

Jameson, Anna Brownell. A Commonplace Book of Thoughts, Memories, and Fancies, Original and Selected. Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1854.
Jameson, Anna Brownell. A First or Mother’s Dictionary for Children.
Jameson, Anna Brownell. A Lady’s Diary. H. Colburn, 1826.
Jameson, Anna Brownell. Anna Jameson: Letters and Friendships (1812-1860). Editor Erskine, Beatrice Caroline, T. Fisher Unwin, 1915.
Jameson, Anna Brownell. Characteristics of Women, Moral, Poetical, and Historical. Saunders and Otley, 1832.
Jameson, Anna Brownell. Companion to the Most Celebrated Private Galleries of Art in London. Saunders and Otley, 1844.
Jameson, Anna Brownell. Handbook to the Public Galleries of Art in and near London. J. Murray, 1842.
Jameson, Anna Brownell, and Wilhelm Heinrich Ludwig Grüner. “Introduction”. The Decorations of the Garden-Pavilion in the Grounds of Buckingham Palace, J. Murray, Longman, P. and D. Colnaghi, F.G. Moon, and L. Grüner, 1846.
Jameson, Anna Brownell. Legends of the Madonna, as Represented in the Fine Arts. Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1852.
Jameson, Anna Brownell. Legends of the Monastic Orders, as Represented in the Fine Arts. Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1850.
Jameson, Anna Brownell, and Ottilie von Goethe. Letters of Anna Jameson to Ottilie von Goethe. Editor Needler, George Henry, Oxford University Press, 1939.
Jameson, Anna Brownell. Memoirs and Essays Illustrative of Art, Literature, and Social Morals. R. Bentley, 1846.
Jameson, Anna Brownell. Memoirs of Celebrated Female Sovereigns. H. Colburn and R. Bentley, 1831.
Jameson, Anna Brownell. Memoirs of the Early Italian Painters. C. Knight, 1845.
Jameson, Anna Brownell. Sacred and Legendary Art. London, Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1848.
Jameson, Anna Brownell. Shakespeare’s Heroines: Characteristics of Women, Moral, Poetical, and Historical. A. L. Burt.
Jameson, Anna Brownell. Sisters of Charity, Catholic and Protestant, Abroad and at Home. Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1855.
Jameson, Anna Brownell. Sisters of Charity, Catholic and Protestant; and, The Communion of Labor. Hyperion Press, 1976.
Amelia, Princess of Saxony,. Social Life In Germany, Illustrated in the Acted Dramas of Her Royal Highness the Princess Amelia of Saxony. Translator Jameson, Anna Brownell, Saunders and Otley, 1840.
Jameson, Anna Brownell. The Beauties of the Court of King Charles the Second. H. Colburne, 1833.
Jameson, Anna Brownell. The Communion of Labour: A Second Lecture on the Social Employments of Women. Longman, Brown, Green, Longmans, and Roberts, 1856.
Jameson, Anna Brownell, and Elizabeth Rigby. The History of Our Lord as Exemplified in Works of Art. London, Longman, Green, Longman, Roberts, and Green, 1864.
Jameson, Anna Brownell. The Loves of the Poets. H. Colburn, 1829.
Jameson, Anna Brownell. “The Milliners”. Criminals, Idiots, Women, and Minors: Nineteenth-Century Writing by Women on Women, edited by Susan Hamilton, Broadview, 1995, pp. 21-6.
Jameson, Anna Brownell. The Relative Position of Mothers and Governesses. Spottiswoode and Shaw, 1848.