Mary Russell Mitford

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Standard Name: Mitford, Mary Russell
Birth Name: Mary Russell Mitford
MRM , poet, playwright, editor, letter-writer, memoirist, and—in just one work—novelist, is best known for her sketches of rural life, especially those in the successive volumes of Our Village (whose first appeared in 1824). Her greatest success came when, under the pressure of her father's inexhaustible capacity for running up debt, she turned from the respected genres of poetry and plays to work at something more popular and remunerative.
Painting of Mary Russell Mitford by John Lucas, c. 1853, based on another by Benjamin Robert Haydon, 1824, which was disliked for its assertive look. Here an oval frame is painted in; Mitford wears a white ruffled cap around her face, a white collar pinned with a cameo, a grey gown and brown shawl.

Connections

Connections Author name Excerpt
Friends, Associates Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Elizabeth Barrett was introduced to Mary Russell Mitford , who became a lifelong friend, by her cousin John Kenyon ; she met Wordsworth the following day.
Forster, Margaret. Elizabeth Barrett Browning: A Biography. Grafton, 1990.
80-2
Browning, Robert, and Elizabeth Barrett Browning. The Brownings’ Correspondence. Editors Kelley, Philip et al., Wedgestone Press, 1984–2026, 14 vols. to date.
3: 320
Friends, Associates Harriet Martineau
HM 's social circle vastly expanded at this time until she knew virtually all the prominent people, particularly the political men, of her day. As she recorded in her Autobiography, however, she refused to...
Friends, Associates Barbara Hofland
BH retained at least one life-long friendship from her Sheffield or Attercliffe days: with the poet and novelist Sarah Pearson , who had been her neighbour there. Pearson's will charged Hofland with the task of...
Friends, Associates Caroline Clive
CC remained a close friend of her early passion Catherine Gore .
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.
She was also acquainted with Mary Russell Mitford , whom she described as priggy,
Clive, Caroline. Caroline Clive. Editor Clive, Mary, Bodley Head, 1949.
266
Elizabeth Barrett Browning ,
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.
and Harriet Martineau
Friends, Associates Anna Jane Vardill
While she lived in London AJV moved in culturally active circles. She later described the poet Eleanor Anne Porden (who lived not far away) as her dear friend, and was one of those who...
Friends, Associates Catherine Gore
CG was acquainted with a number of important literary figures. Before leaving London for the Continent she attended an assembly given by Rosina Bulwer-Lytton to which Disraeli , Lady Morgan , and Letitia Landon also...
Friends, Associates Frances Trollope
Frances's earliest friendships were forged with intelligent young women like herself, such as Marianne Gabell , a headmaster's daughter. She also socialized with older women, including Mrs George Mitford , the mother of Mary Russell Mitford
Friends, Associates Eleanor Anne Porden
EAP met Mary Russell Mitford in summer 1822 at the London house of Mrs Vardill: presumably the mother of the Romantic poet Anna Jane Vardill .
L’Estrange, Alfred Guy Kingham, editor. The Friendships of Mary Russell Mitford as Recorded in Letters from Her Literary Correspondents. Hurst and Blackett, 1882, 2 vols.
1: 121
Vardill was a friend and associate from...
Friends, Associates Maria Jane Jewsbury
Although they had been corresponding by letter for some time, this holiday was the first time the two writers met in person. MJJ was soon accepted into Hemans ' social circle and become friends with...
Health Amelia Opie
Mary Russell Mitford thought AO much changed in April 1813: paler, thinner, and older looking.
Mitford, Mary Russell. The Life of Mary Russell Mitford: Told by Herself in Letters To Her Friends. Editor L’Estrange, Alfred Guy Kingham, Harper and Brothers, 1870, 2 vols.
1: 181
Health Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Her strength and spirit were further weakened by her grief over the death of her longtime though lately somewhat estranged friend, Mary Russell Mitford .
Health Anna Maria Hall
Mary Russell Mitford reported AMH to be very ill: she was, however, using this report to back a thesis that supporting a family was too much for women's health.
Mitford, Mary Russell. The Life of Mary Russell Mitford: Told by Herself in Letters To Her Friends. Editor L’Estrange, Alfred Guy Kingham, Harper and Brothers, 1870, 2 vols.
2: 161-2
Intertextuality and Influence Elizabeth Helme
The Critical reviewed this novel two months after publication. It goes unmentioned by Virgil B. Heltzel in Fair Rosamond. A Study of the Development of a Literary Theme, 1947. Those preceding Helme in treating...
Intertextuality and Influence Marguerite Gardiner Countess of Blessington
The elderly lady, Lady Arabella, represents a chilly view of the English aristocracy. She opens her story with a paean in praise of past times and in dispraise of the present: How interminably long the...
Intertextuality and Influence Susanna Moodie
Critic Carl Ballstadt numbers Suffolk writers Thomas Harral and James Bird among SM 's most important influences. Her sketches are also indebted to Mary Russell Mitford , with whom she corresponded.
New, William H., editor. Dictionary of Literary Biography 99. Gale Research, 1990.
249

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