Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present
Eliza Lynn Linton
-
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.
MC
replied in the pages of the Nineteenth Century, in A Defence of the So-Called Wild Woman, to Eliza Lynn Linton
's attack on such women in the same journal, begun the previous year.
“Dictionary of Literary Biography online”. Gale Databases: Literature Resource Center-LRC.
197
Forward, Stephanie. “A Study in Yellow: Mona Caird’s ’The Yellow Drawing-Room’”. Women’s Writing, Vol.
7
, No. 2, pp. 295-07.
306n25
Literary responses
Rhoda Broughton
The Athenæum, describing Belinda as RB
's worst novel, noted a similarity of her central couple to Dorothea and Casaubon in George Eliot
's Middlemarch. It deemed Eliot's characterisation decidedly superior, maintaning that...
Literary responses
Rhoda Broughton
An article by Eliza Lynn Linton
written in June 1887 (well after the ebbing of RB
's early, scandalous reputation) judged that her books were always essentially love-stories, and nothing else,
Linton, Eliza Lynn. “Miss Broughton’s Novels”. Temple Bar, Vol.
80
, pp. 196-09.
203
but that without...
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...
Literary responses
Rhoda Broughton
Eliza Lynn Linton
, in an article that was in general highly complimentary, defended RB
's characterisation of Lenore: She is irritating and faulty, but not corrupt. Her temper and her taste are both equally...
Textual Features
Rhoda Broughton
The eponymous Nancy, growing up haphazardly with a generally odious father,
Linton, Eliza Lynn. “Miss Broughton’s Novels”. Temple Bar, Vol.
80
, pp. 196-09.
200
is another of RB
's artless heroines. In the words of Eliza Lynn Linton
: She is beautifully pure, if more thoughtless than...
Literary responses
Rhoda Broughton
RB
was convinced that Nancy would be a failure (and threatened in that case to stop writing), as she told Richard Bentley
in a letter bemoaning a negative review in Pall Mall.
Sadleir, Michael. Things Past. Constable.
106
It...
Textual Production
Rhoda Broughton
RB
followed this with Joan, A Tale, 1876, which prompted a writ from Gilbey
's for alleged libel on their sherry and a consequent temporary cessation of the novel's sale. Eliza Lynn Linton
described...
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
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...