Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present
Fanny Kemble
-
Standard Name: Kemble, Fanny
Birth Name: Frances Anne Kemble
Married Name: Frances Anne Butler
FK
was a prolific nineteenth-century writer best known for her journals, which covered her life in the theatre and her residence in the American south. Her first-hand documentation of the institution of slavery was particularly controversial. Apart from her journals she experimented with drama, poetry, and autobiography, and—late in life—wrote her very first and only novel.
FAR
came from the English middle class. She was an Anglican
in religion. Mary Russell Mitford
represents her as a young teacher taking a relaxed attitude to religious ideas in literary contexts (her students were...
Dedications
Anna Brownell Jameson
ABJ
published in two volumes Characteristics of Women, Moral, Poetical and Historical, later renamed Shakespeare
's Heroines; it was dedicated to Fanny Kemble
.
Johnston, Judith. Anna Jameson: Victorian, Feminist, Woman of Letters. Scolar Press, 1997.
237
Stephen, Sir Leslie, and Sidney Lee, editors. The Dictionary of National Biography. Smith, Elder, 1908–2024, 22 vols. plus supplements.
Education
Elizabeth Taylor
Her first school, where she went at the age of six, was a little private establishment called Leopold House, which gave a grounding in English and maths and team games.
Beauman, Nicola. The Other Elizabeth Taylor. Persephone Books, 2009.
Her brother the Rev. James Ogle
performed the ceremony.
“The Times Digital Archive 1785-2007”. Thompson Gale: The Times Digital Archive.
10880 (6 December 1819): 3
This late second marriage was apparently very happy. Tim Brand was a lawyer and in politics a strong Whig, who...
Family and Intimate relationships
Adelaide Kemble
AK
's sister, Fanny
, had dazzling early success as an actress before going on to further fame as a writer, feminist, and activist against slavery in the USA.
Family and Intimate relationships
Adelaide Procter
AP
's mother, born Anne Skepper
, was a clever and observant woman, a frequent and influential hostess to the London literary elite. Frances Kemble
considered her notable for her pungent epigrams and brilliant sallies...
Family and Intimate relationships
Maria Theresa Kemble
Fanny Kemble
, MTK
's elder daughter, was born on 27 November 1809.
Highfill, Philip H. et al. A Biographical Dictionary of Actors, Actresses, Musicians, Dancers, Managers and Other Stage Personnel in London, 1660-1800. Southern Illinois University Press, 1973–1993.
316
Fanny became well known as an actress, writer, and abolitionist.
Blain, Virginia et al., editors. The Feminist Companion to Literature in English: Women Writers from the Middle Ages to the Present. Yale University Press; Batsford, 1990.
Family and Intimate relationships
Jane Welsh Carlyle
As Thomas Carlyle's reputation grew, so did his popularity with women, including Fanny Kemble
, Geraldine Jewsbury, and Harriet Martineau.
Surtees, Virginia. Jane Welsh Carlyle. Michael Russell, 1986.
Carlyle, Jane Welsh. Letters and Memorials of Jane Welsh Carlyle. Editors Carlyle, Thomas and James Anthony Froude, Longmans, Green, 1883, 3 vols.
1: 67
A woman whom Carlyle himself particularly admired was the wealthy and...
Family and Intimate relationships
Ann Hatton
and aunt of the actress and writer Fanny Kemble
.
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
Harriet Martineau
HM
's social circle vastly expanded at this time until she knew virtually all the prominent people, particularly the political men, of her day. As she recorded in her Autobiography, however, she refused to...
Friends, Associates
Frances Power Cobbe
Sometime in the later 1840s or early 1850s FPC
gave a lunch party for her neighbour Harriet St Leger
, and a friend of St Leger's, Fanny Kemble
. Although the lunch went poorly, Kemble...
Friends, Associates
Caroline Norton
Before her marriage CN
had formed a friendship with the Irish poet Tom Moore
, once a crony of her famous grandfather; this friendship endured into her middle age. It was also as Richard Brinsley...
Friends, Associates
Frances Power Cobbe
FPC
also numbered Americans among her wide circle of friends. Louisa May Alcott
recalled vividly how her assumption that FPC
would be a serious, severe lady, of the Cornelia Blimber school was immediately banished on...
Timeline
15 September 1830: The Liverpool and Manchester Railway, the...
National or international item
15 September 1830
The Liverpool and Manchester Railway, the first large-scale passenger steam railway, was officially opened; public timetabled service began on 17 September.
Carlson, Robert E. The Liverpool and Manchester Railway Project 1821-1831. Augustus M. Kelley, 1969.
231-6
Palmer, Alan, and Veronica Palmer. The Chronology of British History. Century, 1992.
256
Bruno, Leonard. On the Move: A Chronology of Advances in Transportation. Gale Research, 1993.
81, 84-5
Ellis, Hamilton. British Railway History: An Outline from the Accession of William IV to the Nationalisation of Railways 1830-1876. George Allen and Unwin, 1954.
17-18
1 April 1857: Herman Melville's last novel, The Confidence-Man:...
Writing climate item
1 April 1857
Herman Melville
's last novel, The Confidence-Man: His Masquerade, appeared.
Athenæum. J. Lection.
1537: 462-3
Melville, Herman. “Foreword”. The Confidence-Man, edited by Hershel Parker, Norton, 1971, p. ix - xi.
ix
The Life and Works of Herman Melville. http://www.melville.org/.
“Dictionary of Literary Biography online”. Gale Databases: Literature Resource Center-LRC.
250
20 March 1863: The executive of the Ladies' London Emancipation...
Mitchell, Sally. Frances Power Cobbe: Victorian Feminist, Journalist, Reformer. University of Virginia Press, 2004.
132
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.
Texts
Kemble, Fanny. A Year of Consolation. E. Moxon, 1847, 2 vols.
Kemble, Fanny. Fanny Kemble: The American Journals. Editor Mavor, Elizabeth, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1990.
Kemble, Fanny. Far Away and Long Ago. Richard Bentley and Son, 1889.
Kemble, Fanny. Francis the First. J. Murray, 1832.
Kemble, Fanny. Further Records, 1848-1883. Richard Bentley, 1890, 2 vols.
Kemble, Fanny, and J. G. Stodart. Further Records, 1848-1883. B. Blom, 1972.
Kemble, Fanny. Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation in 1838-1839. Longman, Green, Longman, Roberts, and Green, 1863.
Kemble, Fanny. Journal of F.A. Butler. J. Murray, 1835, 2 vols.
Kemble, Fanny. Notes upon Some of Shakespeare’s Plays. Richard Bentley and Son, 1882.
Kemble, Fanny et al. Plays. Longman, Green, Longman, Roberts, and Green, 1863.
Kemble, Fanny. Poems. H. G. Clarke, 1844.
Kemble, Fanny. Poems. Richard Bentley and Son, 1883.
Kemble, Fanny. Record of a Girlhood. Richard Bentley and Son, 1878, 3 vols.
Kemble, Fanny. Records of a Girlhood. Henry Holt, 1879.
Kemble, Fanny. Records of Later Life. Richard Bentley and Son, 1882, 3 vols.
Kemble, Fanny. The Adventures of Mr. John Timothy Homespun in Switzerland. Richard Bentley and Son, 1889.
Kemble, Fanny. “The Answer of Frances Anne Butler to the libel of Pierce Butler”. Pierce Butler vs. Frances Anne Butler, 1848, pp. 3-26.
Kemble, Fanny. The Essence of Slavery. Editor Craig, Isa, Emily Faithfull, 1863.
Kemble, Fanny. The Star of Seville. Saunders and Otley, 1837.