Charlotte Yonge

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Standard Name: Yonge, Charlotte
Birth Name: Charlotte Mary Yonge
Pseudonym: Aunt Charlotte
CY was a staggeringly prolific author. Her more than two hundred works include domestic and historical novels for both adults and children, biographies, history and language textbooks, religious manuals, and a fragment of autobiography. She became famous without adopting many of the habits of the Victorian professional author: she published anonymously and donated most of her earnings to charity. Though her most successful titles remained household names for generations, many others in the Macmillan Uniform Edition were quickly forgotten.
Delafield, E. M., and Georgina Battiscombe. “Introduction”. Charlotte Mary Yonge: The Story of an Uneventful Life, Constable and Company, 1943, pp. 9-15.
14
Her underlying purpose is always religious. Her biographer Georgina Battiscombe writes that filial duty is her great theme, to which both love and common sense must be sacrificed.
Battiscombe, Georgina, and E. M. Delafield. Charlotte Mary Yonge: The Story of an Uneventful Life. Constable and Company, 1943.
74-5
She advises submission as a Christian duty and not as an exclusively gendered ideal. She deals also in religious scruples and struggles: confirmation (as the climax of an education in spiritual self-examination) is often an issue for her characters.
Black and white reproduction of an albumen print of Charlotte Yonge's head by the Rev. Duke Yonge, 1858? The image is oval; the sitter is seen in profile facing left. She is wearing a small, light cap, a pale ribbon around her neck fastened with a brooch (perhaps a cameo), and embroidery around her collar. National Portrait Gallery.

Connections

Connections Author name Excerpt
Education Anne Manning
AM was taught at home by both her mother and her father, with the help of masters for special accomplishments,
Oliphant, Margaret et al. Women Novelists of Queen Victoria’s Reign. Hurst and Blackett, 1897.
211
and for a short time by a governess. Charlotte Yonge , who wrote of...
Education Mary Wesley
Mary acquired various country skills, like milking (by hand), butter-making, and of course riding.
Wesley, Mary, and Kim Sayer. Part of the Scenery. Bantam, 2001.
19, 20
She was not expected, however, to need to acquire skills that were marketable. Initially she was educated by about...
Education Lucy Walford
Typically for her class, the young Lucy Colquhoun was placed in the care of a nurse, whom she referred to as Mistress Aitken. She was educated at home by two German governesses, Fräulein Emma Lindemann
Family and Intimate relationships Christabel Coleridge
CC and her distant cousin the novelistCharlotte Yonge shared a close and lifelong friendship.
Family and Intimate relationships Julia Stretton
Charlotte Yonge , writing of JS in Women Novelists of Queen Victoria's Reign, 1897, observes that at this date an abnormally large family was no misfortune to themselves or their parents.
Oliphant, Margaret et al. Women Novelists of Queen Victoria’s Reign. Hurst and Blackett, 1897.
204
Their house...
Family and Intimate relationships Elma Napier
Her husband was the grandson of the first Lord Aldenham and the godson of Charlotte Mary Yonge .
Napier, Elma. Youth Is a Blunder. J. Cape, 1948.
5
He worked for his family firm, whose many foreign interests required him to travel to various countries.
Family and Intimate relationships Margaret Mead
Her engagement at seventeen was probably, like her becoming a Christian, an act of rebellion against her parents, who were both nearly thirty when they married, and who wanted her to wait—especially against her mother...
Family and Intimate relationships Anne Mozley
Her father, Henry Mozley , was a bookseller and publisher. As well as Anne herself, he published Jane Harvey , Charlotte Yonge , and new editions of Hester Chapone 's Letters on the Improvement of...
Friends, Associates Anne Manning
Among her friends was fellow-writer Beatrice Braithwaite Batty , who published posthumous reminiscences of her in the Englishwoman's Review in February 1880. Charlotte Yonge , who praises Manning's qualities as a friend and a letter-writer...
Friends, Associates Edward FitzGerald
Despite a somewhat reclusive life both before and after his separation from his wife within a year of their marriage, he was well connected with the Victorian literary scene, and expressed strong opinions on women...
Friends, Associates Frances Mary Peard
One of FMP 's close friends was Charlotte Yonge , who helped her develop a writing career, and whose earliest surviving letter to her is dated April 1861. For a while Peard was one of...
Friends, Associates Emma Marshall
Her daughter mentions among EM 's friends the gifted Frances Bunnett (who published her translations as F. E. Bunnett), Frances Alleyne (also a translator, as S. [Sarah] F. Alleyne), and Frances Mary Owen
Friends, Associates Christabel Coleridge
In addition to her relationship with Charlotte Yonge , CC had a productive friendship with Mary Bramston . The move to Torquay made her one of a group of women writers in the area, all...
Friends, Associates Mary Linskill
In these straits she found her friends worse than useless; they had never experienced poverty, far less starvation. Jenny Miles apparently reproached her with the fact that George Eliot , Charlotte Yonge , Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Friends, Associates John Strange Winter
JSW had an extensive social circle in London—her biographer, Oliver Bainbridge , notes that a number of social claims were made upon her by reason of her popularity, and that these were always in advance...

Timeline

No timeline events available.

Texts

Yonge, Charlotte. “Preface to First Edition”. History of Christian Names, Macmillan, 1884, p. v - viii.
Yonge, Charlotte. Reasons Why I Am a Catholic and Not a Roman Catholic. Wells Gardner, Darton, 1901.
Yonge, Charlotte. Scenes and Characters. James Burns, 1847.
Yonge, Charlotte. The Caged Lion. Macmillan, 1870.
Yonge, Charlotte. The Chaplet of Pearls. Macmillan, 1868, 2 vols.
Yonge, Charlotte. The Clever Woman of the Family. Macmillan, 1865, 2 vols.
Yonge, Charlotte, and Georgina Battiscombe. The Clever Woman of the Family. Penguin (Virago), 1985.
Yonge, Charlotte. The Daisy Chain. John Parker, 1856.
Yonge, Charlotte. The Daisy Chain. Macmillan, 1892.
Yonge, Charlotte. The Dove in the Eagle’s Nest. Macmillan, 1866.
Yonge, Charlotte. The Heir of Redclyffe. John Parker, 1853, 2 vols.
Yonge, Charlotte. The Heir of Redclyffe. Editor Dennis, Barbara, Oxford University Press, 1997.
Yonge, Charlotte. The Lances of Lynwood. John Parker, 1855.
Yonge, Charlotte. The Little Duke. John Parker, 1854.
Awdry, Frances et al. The Miz Maze. Macmillan, 1883.
Yonge, Charlotte, and Christabel Coleridge, editors. The Monthly Packet. J. and C. Mozely.
Yonge, Charlotte. The Pigeon Pie. J. and C. Mozley, 1860.
Yonge, Charlotte. The Pillars of the House. Macmillan, 1873, 4 vols.
Yonge, Charlotte. The Prince and the Page. Macmillan, 1866.
Yonge, Charlotte. The Seal. 1869.
Yonge, Charlotte. The Stokesley Secret. J. and C. Mozeley, 1861.
Yonge, Charlotte. The Three Brides. Macmillan, 1876, 2 vols.
Yonge, Charlotte. The Trial. Macmillan, 1864, 2 vols.
Yonge, Charlotte. The Two Guardians. Joseph Masters, 1852.
Yonge, Charlotte. The Young Step-Mother. Parker, Son and Bourn, 1861.