Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington
-
Standard Name: Blessington, Marguerite Gardiner,,, Countess of
Birth Name: Margaret Power
Married Name: Margaret Farmer
Self-constructed Name: Marguerite Gardiner
Indexed Name: Marguerite Gardiner
Married Name: Marguerite Gardiner
Titled: Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington
Pseudonym: The Author of the Magic Lantern
Pseudonym: The Author of Sketches and Fragments
Used Form: Marguerite, Lady Blessington
Marguerite Blessington
wrote non-fiction, poetry, and novels, many of them in the silver-fork category. Although she was a popular novelist in her day, well reviewed and respected by a number of other writers, her account of her conversations with Byron
remains the work for which she is remembered. Other works combine memoir with travel writing. In accounts of the literary milieu she is remembered for her editorship of annuals in the 1830s and 1840s and as a brilliant literary hostess.
"Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington" Retrieved from https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/80/Maguerite%2C_Countess_of_Blessington.jpg.This work is licensed under the Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal (CC0 1.0) Public Domain Dedication license. This work is in the public domain.
Since she abhorred her governesses, Elinor took her education into her own hands, reading every book she could in the library: Pepys
's diary, Cervantes
' Don Quixote (an eighteenth-century French version), Scott
, Agnes
Family and Intimate relationships
Caroline Norton
Under Victorian law she was not allowed to participate in the trial. Both her reputation and Melbourne's political career were at stake. In the event the jury found Melbourne innocent without calling one witness for...
Family and Intimate relationships
Dorothy Brett
Brett's paternal grandmother, Eugenie Brett née Meyer, had in youth frequented the salon of the writer Marguerite, Lady Blessington
.
Hignett, Sean. Brett. Franklin Watts, 1985.
10
Family and Intimate relationships
Augusta Ada Byron
Ada's father, the poet Lord Byron
, is well known for his transgressive sexual behaviour of various kinds. His marriage to Lady Byron was shortlived: she left him twelve months after their wedding citing (and...
Friends, Associates
George Gordon, sixth Baron Byron
His final exit from England was made in the company of Hobhouse
, and on the shores of Lake Geneva he met up with Percy
and Mary Shelley
and Mary's step-sister Claire Clairmont
, with...
Friends, Associates
Camilla Crosland
Her work for the annuals led to her connection with Lady Blessington
and her niece Marguerite Power
. Despite the disapproval of other friends she was a regular visitor to Blessington's home, Gore House...
Drabble, Margaret, editor. The Oxford Companion to English Literature. Oxford University Press, 1985.
Friends, Associates
Fanny Aikin Kortright
She was a friend of Nathaniel Hawthorne
(whom she never met, but of whose wife and family she remained a faithful friend and correspondent after Hawthorne's death), Bulwer Lytton
, and Charles Kingsley
(all of...
Friends, Associates
L. E. L.
By the time LEL began living alone, she was well-known in literary circles. She became a good friend of Emma Roberts
and Rosina Bulwer-Lytton
around this time, and gradually became a recognized London public figure...
In France in 1829, Morgan visited at the top of the social spectrum, represented by Baron James de Rothschild
: Rothschild's celebrated chef, Marie-Antoine Carême
(whose list of employers included the Prince Regent), made a...
Literary responses
Camilla Crosland
Marguerite Blessington
wrote to her about two of her early contributions, the The Blind Girl's Lament (1839) and The Maniac (1840), informing her: I have rarely perused two more beautiful poems . . . and...
Occupation
Elizabeth, Margravine of Anspach
Richard Robert Madden
, correspondent and biographer of Marguerite Blessington
, observed EMA
working in her garden at the Villa Cravenin very coarse and singular attire. He did not fail to comment on...
Publishing
Camilla Crosland
The name of Camilla Toulmin (later CC
) appeared in print for the first time as the author of the poem The Parting in Heath's Book of Beauty, edited by Lady Blessington
.
Crosland, Newton. Rambles Round My Life. E. W. Allen, 1898.
346
Boyle, Andrew. An Index to the Annuals. Andrew Boyle, 1967.
292
Publishing
Jane Francesca, Lady Wilde
In March 1855, under her own name, JFLW
published her review of R. R. Madden
's The Literary Life and Correspondence of the Countess of Blessington in the Dublin University Magazine. The review was...
Timeline
March 1836
Walter Savage Landor
published Pericles
and Aspasia, a collection of imaginary letters between the Athenian statesman and the learned and cultivated courtesan.
By 12 May 1845
Benjamin Disraeli
published his condition-of-England novelSybil, or The Two Nations.
Texts
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington,. Conversations of Lord Byron. Richard Bentley, 1834.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington,. Conversations of Lord Byron. J. C. Hotten, 1869.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington,. Conversations of Lord Byron. Editor Lovell, Ernest J., Princeton University Press, 1969.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington, and Marguerite A. Power. Country Quarters. W. Shoberl, 1850.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington,. Desultory Thoughts and Reflections. Longman, Orme, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1839.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington, and Edward Thomas Parris. Gems of Beauty. Longman, Orme, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1836.
L. E. L., and Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington, editors. Heath’s Book of Beauty. Longman, Rees, Orme, Brown, Green, and Longman.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington, editor. Heath’s Book of Beauty. Longman, Orme, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1839.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington,. “Introduction”. Conversations of Lord Byron, edited by Ernest J. Lovell, Princeton University Press, 1969, pp. 3-114.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington,. Journal of a Tour through the Netherlands to Paris, in 1821. Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, 1822.
Hemphill, Barbara. Lionel Deerhurst; or, Fashionable Life under the Regency. Editor Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington, Richard Bentley, 1846.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington,. Marmaduke Herbert; or, The Fatal Error. Richard Bentley, 1847.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington,. Meredith. Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1843.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington,. Rambles in Waltham Forest. Privately Printed by J. L. Cox, 1827.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington,. Sketches and Fragments. Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, 1822.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington,. Strathern; or, Life at Home and Abroad. H. Colburn, 1845.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington, and Alfred Edward Chalon. The Belle of a Season. Longman, Orme, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1840.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington, and Edmund Thomas Parris. The Confessions of an Elderly Gentleman. Longman, Rees, Orme, Brown, Green, and Longman, 1836.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington,. The Confessions of an Elderly Lady. Baudry, 1838.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington, and Edmund Thomas Parris. The Confessions of an Elderly Lady. Longman, Orme, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1838.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington,. The Governess. Longman, Orme, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1839.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington,. The Idler in France. H. Colburn, 1841. http://U of T, http://U of T.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington,. The Idler in Italy. H. Colburn, 1839.
Reynolds, Frederic Mansel, Caroline Norton, Lady Emmeline Stuart Wortley, Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington, and Marguerite A. Power, editors. The Keepsake. Hurst, Chance; R. Jennings.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington,. The Lottery of Life. H. Colburn, 1842.
