Later in life, she did Latin translation with her children and taught herself some Greek, in hopes, according to biographer and critic Robert Lee Wolff
, of remedying the deficiency in her education that caused...
Family and Intimate relationships
Mary Elizabeth Braddon
While appearing on stage MEB
must have found it a challenge to protect herself from unwanted sexual attentions. She attracted the attention, apparently without meeting disapproval from her mother, of newspaper proprietor Charles Bray
(who...
Literary responses
Mary Elizabeth Braddon
Margaret Oliphant
's critique of the sensation novel in 1867 relied heavily on attacking MEB
's reputation. The best she would say was that some of Braddon's works deserved some of their success. Braddon's sole...
Literary responses
May Laffan
This book sold well, and remains ML
's most successful novel.
Kahn, Helena Kelleher. Late Nineteenth-Century Ireland’s Political and Religious Controversies in the Fiction of May Laffan Hartley. ELT, 2005.
72
Some initial reviews were favourable, but most afforded Hogan, M.P. at best lukewarm praise. The Protestant, Unionist Dublin University Magazine declared that though...
Literary responses
Mary Augusta Ward
MAW
's meticulous character study and tragic love story is sometimes considered her best novel. It was positively received by George Meredith
, Sir J. M. Barrie
, and Henry James. James
wrote to her...
Literary responses
Mary Elizabeth Braddon
Robert Lee Wolff
considers this, with Joshua Haggard's Daughter, one of her two masterpieces.
Wolff, Robert Lee. Sensational Victorian. Garland, 1979.
8
Literary responses
Mary Elizabeth Braddon
The Athenæum praised MEB
's command of English and avoidance of sensationalism in this work.
Athenæum. J. Lection.
3164 (1888): 759
Her biographer Robert Lee Wolff
judged it to be the best of all her sensation novels.
Burmester, James, Rosamund Burmester, and Emma Pound. English Books. James Burmester Rare Books, 1985.
69: 36
Literary responses
Mary Elizabeth Braddon
Critic Robert Lee Wolff
places this among MEB
's best works for its psychological delicacy and stylistic economy and its bold treatment of physical love.
Wolff, Robert Lee. Sensational Victorian. Garland, 1979.
392, 395
Publishing
Annie Keary
She had worked on this novel both at Pégomas near Cannes in the South of France and at her home in Kensington. For some reason she found none of her usual pleasure in composition...
Publishing
May Laffan
A new edition of Hogan, M.P. appeared from Macmillan
in 1881 (reissued in 1883), and a New York edition from G. Munro
in 1882. The novel was thereafter out of print until Garland Publishing
reprinted...
Publishing
Mary Elizabeth Braddon
From late 1861 MEB
published in her future husband John Maxwell
's Temple Bar, edited by George Augustus Sala
, a periodical which aimed to compete with the prestigious Cornhill Magazine.
Wolff, Robert Lee. Sensational Victorian. Garland, 1979.
115-17
In...
Publishing
Mary Elizabeth Braddon
A subplot excised in revision as Henry Dunbar was recycled into the short story Lost and Found: this removed the bigamy and blackmail from the novel. This time the novel in book form was...
Publishing
Charlotte Riddell
A New York edition from Harper, compressing three volumes to one, appeared the following year. A Garland
facsimile appeared in 1979 in a series on Ireland and Irish politics, with an introduction by Robert Lee Wolff
Textual Features
Mary Elizabeth Braddon
A dashing East India Company
officer bilks the heir to a baronetcy of his fortune by kidnapping him and substituting the murderous son of a gamekeeper, who is in turn murdered by the family of...
Textual Features
Mary Elizabeth Braddon
The philanthropic aristocrat Charles Raymond in this story is based on MEB
's friend Charles Bray
.
Carnell, Jennifer. The Literary Lives of Mary Elizabeth Braddon: A Study of Her Life and Work. Sensation Press, 2000.
53
Wolff
sees Isabel (who during her youth lives as did MEB
in Camberwell) as a kind...
Timeline
No timeline events available.
Texts
Wolff, Robert Lee, Mary Elizabeth Braddon, Edward George Earle Lytton Bulwer-Lytton, first Baron Lytton, Mary Elizabeth Braddon, and Edward George Earle Lytton Bulwer-Lytton, first Baron Lytton. “Devoted Disciple: The Letters of Mary Elizabeth Braddon to Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton, 1862-1873”. Harvard Library Bulletin, Vol.
22
, pp. 1 - 35, 129.
Wolff, Robert Lee. Gains and Losses: Novels of Faith and Doubt in Victorian England. Garland, 1977.
Wolff, Robert Lee, and May Laffan. “May Laffan Hartley and Two Examples of her Irish Fiction”. Hogan, M.P., Garland, 1979, p. v - ix.
Wolff, Robert Lee. Nineteenth-Century Fiction. Garland, 1986.
Wolff, Robert Lee. Sensational Victorian. Garland, 1979.
Wolff, Robert Lee. The Golden Key. Yale University Press, 1961.
