Hannah More

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Standard Name: More, Hannah
Birth Name: Hannah More
Nickname: Nine
Pseudonym: A Young Lady
Pseudonym: The Author of Percy
Pseudonym: H. M.
Pseudonym: Will Chip, a Carpenter
During her long and phenomenally productive career HM wrote plays, poems, a single novel and much social, religious, and political commentary. She was the leading conservative and Christian moralist of her day. Her political opinions were reactionary, and her passionate commitment to educating the poor and lessening their destitution has been judged as marred by its paternalist tone. But she was a pioneer educator and philanthropist, with enormous influence on the Victorian age.
Orlando gratefully acknowledges help with this document from Mary Waldron. Any flaws or errors are, of course, not hers.
Photograph of a painting of Hannah More by Henry William Pickersgill, 1822. She is seated on a red-upholstered chair beside a little table draped in red fabric and bearing a quill pen, inkwell, and piece of paper. She wears a blue-green mantle with V neck and creamy fabric at the cuffs and neckline, finished with a ruff around her neck. She has a gold shawl and a cap topped with pale blue ribbons. More wrote that she was "condemned, sorely against her will," to sit for this portrait. The version here, in th
Print of Barley Wood, Hannah More's home for almost thirty years. The print's grey tones depict a wooded countryside with some of Barley Wood's twenty acres. One of two female figures in the mid-ground is pointing towards the house.

Connections

Connections Author name Excerpt
Friends, Associates Mary Matilda Betham
As well as meeting at Llangollen with Lady Eleanor Butler and Sarah Ponsonby (who later talked with high praise of her),
Betham, Ernest, editor. A House of Letters. Jarrold and Sons.
69, 70
MMB acquired a wide acquaintance in London. She became a close friend...
Textual Production Mary Matilda Betham
MMB 's collateral descendant Ernest Betham makes much use in relating her family history of a Memorandum Book, from my Birth, 1776, till July, 1795, which covers some of the functions of both autobiography...
Intertextuality and Influence Susanna Blamire
This ballad resembles in theme and technique those among Hannah More 's Cheap Repository Tracts (which it pre-dates by several years). Here Ned—who looks forward, on the strength of Reets o' Man, to taking a...
Textual Production Henrietta Maria Bowdler
HMB 's letters to Sarah Ponsonby reveal the closeness of their friendship. She sent information, opinion, and verse, some of it probably written by herself. Among books she discussed were Ann Radcliffe 's The Mysteries...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Henrietta Maria Bowdler
In this work HMB warns against improper choice of friends and the excesses of romantic friendship, even while she idealises true friendship. She praises the well-employed talents of Elizabeth Montagu , Elizabeth Smith , Hannah More
Intertextuality and Influence Mary Ann Cavendish Bradshaw
There follows a fighting critical Dissertation Respecting Patrons and Dedications, which covers the issues of male disrespect for female authors, the tyranny of critics, and over-insistence on moral instruction (with Hannah More 's Coelebs...
Publishing Amelia Bristow
A list of about 210 subscribers is given in the volume. They included Hannah More and Jane and Anna Maria Porter . A sixth edition appeared in 1847.
Loeber, Rolf, and Magda Loeber. A Guide to Irish Fiction 1650-1900. Four Courts.
180
Garside, Peter et al., editors. The English Novel 1770-1829. Oxford University Press.
2: 660
The full title is...
Education Anne Brontë
Their later reading drew on a selection of standard texts including Oliver Goldsmith 's History of England, Hannah More 's Moral Sketches, John Bunyan 's Pilgrim's Progress, Isaac Watts 's Doctrine of...
Education Charlotte Brontë
The fees for the school were £14 per year. It was primarily an Evangelical school aimed to assist needy clergymen with the education of their daughters in a plain and useful Education, which may best...
Education Charlotte Brontë
Their education continued at home from a selection of standard texts including Oliver Goldsmith 's History of England, Hannah More 's Moral Sketches, John Bunyan 's Pilgrim's Progress, Isaac Watts 's Doctrine...
Education Emily Brontë
Thereafter, Patrick Brontë educated his remaining children at home, using standard educational texts including Thomas Salmon 's A New Geographical and Historical Grammar, a condensed version of Oliver Goldsmith 's History of England,...
Friends, Associates Frances Brooke
Hannah More and Anna Seward were among the invited guests. The anecdotalist Baptist Noel Turner later related from FB 's own mouth a story of Johnson asking her to withdraw from the others so that...
Intertextuality and Influence Frances Brooke
This novel became notorious for its hostile portrait of Garrick . It also complains of the lack of outlets for new plays, attacks Town and Country Magazine for its Tete-a-Tete feature of gossip or scandal...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Mary Ann Browne
Her title poem is rich and dignified, written in Spenser ian stanzas. The later Ocean is a poem in similar style. Many other pieces are social and sentimental, with titles like Tears, Loves...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Mary Ann Browne
The poems give little evidence that MAB at the end of her life shared the sentiments of her editor. In the earlier selection, The Gifted proclaims woe to people of exceptional talent—but its anonymous warning...

Timeline

15 July 1819: Byron began to publish in instalments (opening...

Writing climate item

15 July 1819

Byron began to publish in instalments (opening with cantos one and two) his satiricalmock-epicpoemDon Juan; he left it unfinished at his death.

1861: A company in Salem, Massachusetts, issued...

Writing climate item

1861

A company in Salem, Massachusetts, issued what seems to be the earliest version of a game called Authors, whose object was to collect sets of cards bearing the names of writers and the...

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.

By 18 August 1888: Lucy Walford published Four Biographies from...

Women writers item

By 18 August 1888

Lucy Walford published Four Biographies from Blackwood's.

14 October 1902: St Deiniol's Library, situated near Hawarden...

Building item

14 October 1902

St Deiniol's Library , situated near Hawarden Castle under the Welsh mountains, founded by William Ewart Gladstone to bring together readers who lacked books, was officially opened.

Texts

More, Hannah. The Inflexible Captive. S. Farley, 1774.
More, Hannah. The Literary Manuscripts and Letters of Hannah More. Editor Smith, Nicholas D., Ashgate, 2008.
More, Hannah. The Spirit of Prayer. T. Cadell, 1825.
More, Hannah. The Village Disputants. J. Hatchard, 1817.
More, Hannah. The Works of Hannah More. T. Cadell and W. Davies, 1801.
More, Hannah. Thoughts on the Importance of the Manners of the Great to general Society. T. Cadell, 1788.
More, Hannah. Village Politics. F. and C. Rivington, 1793.
More, Hannah, and William Roberts. Works. H. Fisher, R. Fisher, and P. Jackson, 1834.