Eliza Lynn Linton

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Standard Name: Linton, Eliza Lynn
Birth Name: Elizabeth Lynn
Married Name: Elizabeth Linton
Indexed Name: Mrs Lynn Linton
Indexed Name: E. Lynn Linton
ELL was a Victorian novelist and memoirist whose historical importance rests largely on her pioneering role as a professional journalist who blazed a trail for her sex. She both held and promoted radical views early in life. Nevertheless, as is well known, many of her 200 periodical contributions are antifeminist essays which celebrate traditional women in traditional roles, and ridicule attempts at new departures for women as either a fad or a sham.
Photo of a carbon print of Eliza Lynn Linton by W. and D. Downey, published by Cassell, 1890. She sits at a small chinoiserie table with lattice-style legs, as if paused in the act of writing on a sheaf of papers. Her right hand holds a pen; her chin rests on her left. She has a broad face with wire spectacles perched on her nose, and wears a white cap and a dark (black?) dress in several layers, with lace at the wrists and a good deal of dark decoration including jet beads sewn on. She has a metal cuff bra

Connections

Connections Author name Excerpt
death Julia Pardoe
In her last days she suffered badly from insomnia. According to Eliza Lynn Linton she died in bitter poverty, in a top room somewhere in or about Baker Street, deserted by the gay world...
Education C. E. Plumptre
Though nothing is know of CEP 's early education, in later life she kept an extensive library. On visiting her, Frederick James Gould noted that it was selected and arranged in an impressive order which...
Family and Intimate relationships Margery Lawrence
He worked mostly in meals for hotels and railways, but served on government food committees in both world wars.
“The Times Digital Archive 1785-2007”. Thompson Gale: The Times Digital Archive.
(2 September 1948): 6
Curiously, ML describes her marrying him in a poem titled Aspasia Married...
Family and Intimate relationships Agnes Strickland
The relationship between Agnes and Elizabeth, the writing partners, was extremely close. Eliza Lynn Linton writes of the devoted love and subservience of Elizabeth, the working bee, to Agnes, the caressed and fêted butterfly.
Linton, Eliza Lynn, and Beatrice Harraden. My Literary Life. Hodder and Stoughton, 1899.
90
Friends, Associates Mrs Alexander
In London, Annie French joined a literary circle which included Anna Maria Hall , Eliza Lynn Linton , and W. H. Wills , co-editor of Household Words.
Sutherland, John, b. 1938. The Stanford Companion to Victorian Fiction. Stanford University Press, 1989.
Stephen, Sir Leslie, and Sidney Lee, editors. The Dictionary of National Biography. Smith, Elder, 1908–2024, 22 vols. plus supplements.
Linton introduced her to author Joshua Davidson
Friends, Associates George Eliot
In addition to his intellectual heterodoxy, Charles Bray was a sexual nonconformist. He had several illegitimate children, of whom he and his wife adopted at least one. GE may or may not have known about...
Friends, Associates Kate Parry Frye
KPF met Millicent Garrett Fawcett in 1896.
qtd. in
Frye, Kate Parry. “Introduction”. Campaigning for the Vote: Kate Parry Frye’s Suffrage Diary, edited by Elizabeth Crawford, Francis Boutle Publishers, 2013, pp. 9-34.
27
Her diary mentions meeting briefly many leaders in the suffrage campaign. Her fellow activists and sympathizers included: sisters Alexandra and Gladys Wright ; Sanitary Inspector and fellow...
Friends, Associates Thomas Moore
His social circle included prominent literary women: Mary Tighe , sisters Lady Morgan (Sydney Owenson) and Olivia Clarke , Mary Shelley , Marguerite Blessington , Louisa Stuart Costello , and Caroline Norton . He knew...
Friends, Associates Beatrice Harraden
BH described herself as the literary god-daughter of Eliza Lynn Linton . (Her literary godfather was William Blackwood ). Her first meeting with Linton (the turning-point of her life, she wrote)
Harraden, Beatrice. “Mrs. Lynn Linton”. The Bookman, Vol.
8
, Sept. 1898, pp. 16-17.
16
took place in...
Friends, Associates Beatrice Harraden
Apart from Eliza Lynn Linton , her close literary friends included Evelyn Glover , Catharine Amy Dawson Scott , Evelyn Sharp , and Flora Annie Steel (with whom she corresponded).
Friends, Associates Herbert Spencer
His broad social circle included several other women writers. Frances Power Cobbe , Eliza Lynn Linton , Matilda Betham-Edwards , and sisters Maria Grey and Emily Shirreff , were all his acquaintances. Later in life...
Intertextuality and Influence Louisa May Alcott
In a preface to the volume Alcott declares that her heroine, Polly, is not intended as a perfect model, but as a possible improvement upon [Eliza Lynn Linton 's] Girl of the Period, who...
Intertextuality and Influence Mrs Alexander
MA 's circle of literary friends in London were influential in the publication of Billeted in Boulogne. Anna Maria Hall , her countrywoman, introduced MA to W. H. Wills , the editor of Household...
Intertextuality and Influence Rhoda Broughton
The central characters, critical Paul Le Mesurier and spoiled, outspoken Lenore Herrick, fall in love early on, but the novel's later volumes depict the collapse of their relationship brought about by Lenore's pride and Paul's...
Intertextuality and Influence John Strange Winter
In her study of Golden Gates, critic Molly Youngkin notes that from 1892 it became increasingly concerned with gender and social issues. In a memorable response to Eliza Lynn Linton 's piece The Wild...

Timeline

6 July 1839: In A Diary in America, Frederick Marryat...

Writing climate item

6 July 1839

In A Diary in America, Frederick Marryat promoted the stereotype that middle-class Americans adhered to a more strict paradigm of prudishness than their British counterparts, and apparently gave rise to the myth that Victorians...

1842: A bill to legalize marriage between a man...

Building item

1842

A bill to legalize marriage between a man and his deceased wife's sister was introduced in the House of Commons . It did not pass.
Anderson, Nancy F. “The ’Marriage with a Deceased Wife’s Sister Bill’ Controversy: Incest Anxiety and the Defense of Family Purity in Victorian England”. Journal of British Studies, Vol.
21
, No. 2, 1982, pp. 67-86.
68, 79
Behrman, Cynthia Fansler. “The Annual Blister: A Sidelight on Victorian Social History and Parliamentary History”. Victorian Studies, Vol.
11
, June 1968, pp. 483-02.
490

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 .
Barwick, George. The Reading Room of the British Museum. Ernest Benn, 1929.
65, 71, 88, 102, 104-5, 136, 139
Walkowitz, Judith R. City of Dreadful Delight. University of Chicago Press, 1992.
69

1876: John Maxwell sold Belgravia to Chatto and...

Writing climate item

1876

John Maxwell sold Belgravia to Chatto and Windus , ending Mary Elizabeth Braddon 's association with the monthly.
Edwards, Peter David et al. Indexes to Fiction in Belgravia 1867-1899. Victorian Fiction Research Unit, Department of English, University of Queensland, 1989.
passim

Late 1888: Harry Quilter published Is Marriage a Failure?,...

Building item

Late 1888

Harry Quilter published Is Marriage a Failure?, a collection of contributions to the debate aroused by Mona Caird 's critique of marriage.
British Library Catalogue. http://explore.bl.uk/primo_library/libweb/action/search.do?dscnt=0&tab=local_tab&dstmp=1489778087340&vid=BLVU1&mode=Basic&fromLo.
BLC
Hammerton, A. James. Cruelty and Companionship: Conflict in Nineteenth-Century Married Life. Routledge, 1992.
chronology

19 March 1891: The ruling in R. v Jackson established that...

Building item

19 March 1891

The ruling in R. v Jackson established that it was illegal in Britain for a husband to beat or imprison his wife.
Emsley, Clive. Crime and Society in England 1750-1900. 2nd ed., Longman, 1996.
160
Shanley, Mary Lyndon. Feminism, Marriage, and the Law in Victorian England. Princeton University Press, 1989.
177-182

Texts

Linton, Eliza Lynn. Amymone. Richard Bentley, 1848, 3 vols.
Linton, Eliza Lynn. An Octave of Friends. Ward and Downey, 1891.
Linton, Eliza Lynn. “Appendix B: Essays by Eliza Lynn Linton”. The Rebel of the Family, edited by Deborah T. Meem, Broadview, 2002, pp. 403-27.
Anderson, Nancy F., and Eliza Lynn Linton. “Appendix C: The Rebel of the Family: The Life of Eliza Lynn Linton”. The Rebel of the Family, edited by Deborah T. Meem and Deborah T. Meem, Broadview, 2002, pp. 428-40.
Broomfield, Andrea, and Eliza Lynn Linton. “Appendix D: Blending Journalism with Fiction: Eliza Lynn Linton and Her Rise to Fame as a Popular Novelist”. The Rebel of the Family, edited by Deborah T. Meem and Deborah T. Meem, Broadview, 2002, pp. 441-55.
Harsh, Constance, and Eliza Lynn Linton. “Appendix E: Eliza Lynn Linton as a New Woman Novelist”. The Rebel of the Family, edited by Deborah T. Meem and Deborah T. Meem, Broadview, 2002, pp. 456-74.
Sanders, Valerie, and Eliza Lynn Linton. “Appendix F: Eliza Lynn Linton and the Canon”. The Rebel of the Family, edited by Deborah T. Meem and Deborah T. Meem, Broadview, 2002, pp. 475-87.
Linton, Eliza Lynn. Azeth, the Egyptian. T. C. Newby, 1847, 3 vols.
Linton, Eliza Lynn. Dulcie Everton. Chatto and Windus, 1896, 2 vols.
Linton, Eliza Lynn. Grasp Your Nettle. Smith and Elder, 1865, 3 vols.
Linton, Eliza Lynn. In Haste and at Leisure. W. Heinemann, 1895, 3 vols.
Linton, Eliza Lynn. “Introduction”. The Rebel of the Family, edited by Deborah T. Meem, Broadview, 2002, pp. 9-18.
Linton, Eliza Lynn. Ione. Chatto and Windus, 1883, 3 vols.
Mathers, Helen et al. “Is Society a Pleasure or a Bore?”. The Idlers’ Club, Vol.
9
, No. 6, pp. 907-14.
Linton, Eliza Lynn. Lizzie Lorton of Greyrigg. Tinsley Brothers, 1866, 3 vols.
Linton, Eliza Lynn. “Miss Broughton’s Novels”. Temple Bar, Vol.
80
, pp. 196-09.
Linton, Eliza Lynn, and Beatrice Harraden. My Literary Life. Hodder and Stoughton, 1899.
Linton, Eliza Lynn. Ourselves. G. Routledge and Sons, 1869.
Linton, Eliza Lynn. Patricia Kemball. Chatto and Windus, 1875, 3 vols.
Linton, Eliza Lynn. Realities. Saunders and Otley, 1851, 3 vols.
Linton, Eliza Lynn. Sowing the Wind. Tinsley Brothers, 1867, 3 vols.
Linton, Eliza Lynn. The Atonement of Leam Dundas. Chatto and Windus, 1876, 3 vols.
Linton, Eliza Lynn. The Autobiography of Christopher Kirkland. Bentley and Son, 1885, 3 vols.
Linton, Eliza Lynn. “The Girl of the Period; The Modern Revolt; The Wild Women: as Politicians; The Wild Women: as Social Insurgents”. Criminals, Idiots, Women and Minors: Victorian Writing by Women on Women, edited by Susan Hamilton, Broadview, 1995, pp. 172-07.
Linton, Eliza Lynn. The Rebel of the Family. Chatto and Windus, 1880, 3 vols.