TYBA Semester V, Subject: English, Paper VII, 19th Century English Literature I, Background Topics. Rise of Women Writers in the Romantic Period

1. T Y B A E n g l i s h , S e m e s t e r V ,
P a p e r V I I , 1 9 t h C e n t u r y E n g l i s h L i t e r a t u r e
B a c k g r o u n d T o p i c s
T o p i c : R i s e o f W o m e n W r i t e r s i n t h e R o m a n t i c P e r i o d
Rise of Women Writers in the
Romantic Period
Mrs. Madhura Date,
Department of English,
Gogate Jogalekar College, Ratnagiri.

2. Background
 Gender and genre
 Marginalization of women writers in the literary canon
 Neglect, indifference to and ignorance of women writing
 e.g. Aphra Behn, Eliza Heywood, Jane Barker neglected,
underestimated.
 Several works lost as well.
 However around 1960s feminist archivists, literary historians made
attempts to retrieve some of the works written by women writers.
 Cheryl Turner (Living by the Pen 1992) - 176 authors, 446 works
between 1696 and 1796)

3. Social background of the period
 ‘Feminization’ of the novel
 Change in laws --- changes in copyright laws --- complementary to the
rise of women writing
 Decline of aristocratic patronage
 Increase in the number of publishers
 The growth of the leisure industry
 Increase in literary professionalism
 Massive expansion of readership
 Extensive circulation
 Increasing libraries
 Everyone had access to fiction
The flourishing of the print culture

4.  Major genres ---- autobiographies, novels, lives and memoirs
 Female professionalism not encouraged much
 Women writers had to defend their choices of themes
 In the previous age, savage attacks against Eliza Haywood by Alexander Pope (in
Dunciad 1728) had almost destroyed her career. Haywood wrote very little after
1728
 The rise of virtuous professional women writers after 1740 ---- Katherine Phillips,
Penelope Aubin, Elizabeth Rowe --- they were much praised by Johnson
 Followed by Sarah Fielding , Elizabeth Griffith, Charlotte Lennox---- a process of
‘feminization’.
 Increased acceptance , respectability, readership
 Frances Burney ---- made novel writing respectable --- “The Mother of English
Fiction” as called by Virginia Woolf
 Legitimizing of the woman’s voices

5. The Women writers of the Romantic Period
 Mary Wollstonecraft
 Frances Burney
 Mary Shelley
 Jane Austen
 Maria Edgeworth

6. Mary Wollstonecraft
 wrote novels, treatises, a travel narrative, a history of
the French Revolution, a conduct book, and a children's
book.
 best known for A Vindication of the Rights of
Woman (1792)---- argues that women are not naturally
inferior to men, but appear to be only because they lack
education. She suggests that both men and women
should be treated as rational beings and imagines a social
order founded on reason.

7. Frances Burney
 Frances Burney (13 June 1752 – 6 January 1840), also known
as Fanny Burney and later Madame d'Arblay, was an English
satirical novelist, diarist and playwright.
 The first of her four novels, Evelina (1778), had the best
success and remains best regarded.
 made novel writing respectable --- “The Mother of English
Fiction” as called by Virginia Woolf
 Most of her plays were not performed in her lifetime. She
wrote a memoir of her father (1832) and many letters and
journals that have been gradually published since 1889.

8. Mary Shelley
 Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley was an English novelist
who wrote the Gothic novel Frankenstein; or, The
Modern Prometheus (1818), which is considered an early
example of science fiction.
 also edited and promoted the works of her husband,
the Romantic poet and philosopher Percy Bysshe Shelley.
 daughter to the political philosopher William
Godwin and the philosopher and feminist activist Mary
Wollstonecraft.

9. Jane Austen
 Jane Austen was an English novelist known primarily for her six
major novels, which interpret, critique and comment upon the
British landed gentry at the end of the 18th century.
 Austen's plots often explore the dependence of women on marriage
in the pursuit of favourable social standing and economic security.
 Her works critique the novels of sensibility of the second half of the
18th century and are part of the transition to 19th-century literary
realism.
 Her use of biting irony, along with her realism, humour, and social
commentary, have long earned her acclaim among critics, scholars,
and popular audiences alike.

10. Maria Edgeworth
 Maria Edgeworth (1 January 1768 – 22 May 1849) was a
prolific Anglo-Irish writer of adults' and children's literature. She
was one of the first realist writers in children's literature and was a
significant figure in the evolution of the novel in Europe.
 Children’s literature --- stories which are richer in human interest
 Also a novelist of local colour , especially in her Irish novels
 Castle Rackrent ----first long story ---- influenced latter novelists.
 The Absentee and Ormond--- two Irish novels
 Tales of Fashionable Life

11. Other women writers of the period
 Mary Alcock – wrote in many poetic forms
 The Chimney Sweeper’s Complaint (1799)
 Susanna Blamire – known to the lake poets –
 She is a great documenter of country life. She deserved to be
considered with Burns and George Crabbe.
 1842- Collected poems

12.  Clara Reeve – a novelist , however best known for her treatise
named ‘ An Argument in Favour of the Natural Equality of Both the
Sexes’ – 1765
 Anna Laetitia Barbauld – inspired by American declaration of
independence and the French revolution .
 The Rights of Woman – important work--- Writtten in 1795 , published in 1825 --
- “Make trecherous Man, thy subject, not thy friend”
 Edited 50 volumes of The British Novelists (1810)
 Eighteen Hundered and Eleven (1812) – one of the first texts that forsees the
decline of British empire and the increasing prosperity of America

13.  Felicia Browne (Felicia Hemans)
 Immensely prolific writer
 Domestic Affections (1812), The Forest Sanctuary (1829)
 Not challenging the status quo
 Not very radical
 Never had difficulty in getting her works published
 The biggest selling poet of the first half of 19th century.

14.  Mary Robinson (born Mary Darby)
 A poet , novelist, philosopher, feminist, actress and a celebrity
 The Haunted Beach (1800) is her famous work.
 Letitaia Elizabeth Landon
 Used her initials L.E.L to sign her works
 The first woman to earn her living entirely from writing
 Ethel Churchill (1837) – her famous work

15.  Mary Jane Jewsbury
 First publication a satirical poem
 Anonymously published Phantasmagoria or Sketches of Life
and Literature - two- volume collection of poems , literary
sketches, short fiction --- was dedicated to William
Wordsworth who praised her work.

16.  Lucy Aikin
 Began her literary career at the age of 20 as an editor and a
children’s writer
 Important works: Epistles of Women, Exemplifying their
Character and Condition in Various Ages and Nations : With
Miscellaneous Poems
 Lorimer – a Gothic novel
 Reviewed poems from Lyrical Ballads

17.  Susan Ferrier
 A scottish regional writer
 A clever painter of the Scottish (Like Maria Edgeworth’s Irish
characters)
 three novels of Scottish life : Marriage (1818), The Inheritance
(1824) and Destiny (1831)
 Had acute observation of life just like that of Austen , however she
had a more didactic intent.
 Her contribution to the Scottish regional novel writing is neglected
being overshadowed by the contribution and the popularity of Walter
Scott.

18.  The role played by men :
 Joseph Johnson: a radical, the editor of the
Analytical Review, published the works of
Wollstonecraft, Lucy Aikin and Anna Letitia
Barbauld
 Thomas Longman III : associated with the Annual
Review, Athenaeum – the leading periodicals of the
time . Published the works of Maria Jane Jewsbury.

19. References
 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YgZGaX1U7Pc
 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZO2ay8IbAS4
 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Wollstonecraft
 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frances_Burney
 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Shelley
 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Austen
 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maria_Edgeworth

20. Thank You !