Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present
Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
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Standard Name: Montagu, Lady Mary Wortley
Birth Name: Mary Pierrepont
Styled: Lady Mary Pierrepont
Nickname: Flavia
Nickname: Sappho
Married Name: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
Indexed Name: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
Pseudonym: Strephon
Pseudonym: Clarinda
Pseudonym: A Turkey Merchant
LMWM
, eighteenth-century woman of letters, identified herself as a writer, a sister of the quill
Montagu, Lady Mary Wortley. The Complete Letters of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. Editor Halsband, Robert, Clarendon Press, 1965–1967, 3 vols.
3: 173
haunted by the daemon of poetry. She wrote poems, essays, letters (including the letters from Europe and Turkey which she later recast as a highly successful travel book), fiction (including adult fairy-tale, oriental tale, and full-length mock romance), satire, a diary, a play, a political periodical, and a history of her own times. Not all of these survive. Best known in her lifetime for her poetry, she is today still best known for her letters.
Montagu, Lady Mary Wortley. The Complete Letters of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. Editor Halsband, Robert, Clarendon Press, 1965–1967, 3 vols.
In the earlier 1840s, however, she was still a keen reader. She tackled the first edition of Frances Burney
's Diary and Letters out of a desire to get some insight into the literary society...
Literary responses
Sarah Scott
The Monthly Review thought that this novel, though stiff and formal, was promising; that it was influenced by Marivaux
' Marianne;and that it was written by a man.
Griffiths, Ralph, 1720 - 1803, and George Edward Griffiths, editors. Monthly Review. R. Griffiths.
3 (May 1750): 59-61
Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
Literary responses
Teresia Constantia Phillips
An outcry greeted the publication, and pamphlets of attack and defence followed. The Gentleman's Magazine printed two anonymous epistles addresssed to TCP
in August. After the second volume appeared, Henry Muilman
made an attempt to...
Literary responses
Eliza Haywood
In the Monthly Review, Ralph Griffiths
passed a judgement which was inflected against Betsy Thoughtless by issues of gender. He guessed that the author was female because of the novel's attention to matters of...
Literary responses
Anna Maria van Schurman
This work became fairly well-known among Englishwomen interested in the issue of education for their sex. Her correspondence with Bathsua Makin
ensured that the influence of AMS
in England was practical as well as theoretical....
Literary responses
Charlotte Lennox
In Fielding's detailed comparison of the novel with Don Quixote, Lennox emerges superior to Cervantes
in morality, probability, and character-drawing, though Cervantes is superior in other ways. This enthusiastic review was widely reprinted.
Catto, Susan J. Modest Ambition: The Influence of Henry Fielding, Samuel Richardson, and the Ideal of Female Diffidence on Sarah Fielding, Charlotte Lennox, and Frances Brooke. University of Oxford, 1998.
176
Literary responses
Elizabeth Singer Rowe
In a later generation Anna Letitia Barbauld
followed Hertford and Carter in celebrating ESR
her in poetry. Such different figures as Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
and Clara Reeve
endorsed her. She had a huge following...
Literary responses
Marie-Catherine de Villedieu
In her copy of this text (an edition published in 1721 in twelve volumes),Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
wrote: plus delicat que Crebillon
[evidently the younger of this name, famous for erotic fiction], plus amusant...
Literary responses
Susan Smythies
The Monthly Review was not impressed: it thought the book hastily written, thin, and uninteresting.
Griffiths, Ralph, 1720 - 1803, and George Edward Griffiths, editors. Monthly Review. R. Griffiths.
9 (1753): 394
Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
, on the other hand, appreciated the Grotesque Figures that amuse,
Montagu, Lady Mary Wortley. The Complete Letters of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. Editor Halsband, Robert, Clarendon Press, 1965–1967, 3 vols.
3: 89
Literary responses
Judith Cowper Madan
JCM
reaped a good deal of praise during her lifetime, but most of it must have been of questionable value to her as a poet. Pope
's To Erinna is typical in casting her as...
Literary responses
Delarivier Manley
A series of various keys attached to later editions fed curiosity about the originals of DM
's portraits, without actually giving very much away.
Manley, Delarivier. “Introduction”. New Atalantis, edited by Ros Ballaster, Pickering and Chatto, 1991, p. v - xxviii.
xv
Her work can claim some credit for the collapse of...
Literary responses
Laetitia Pilkington
Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
wrote in her copy of the London reprint of LP
's Memoirs, as good Poetry as Pope
s [sic].
Montagu, Lady Mary Wortley, and Laetitia Pilkington. “Annotation”. The Memoirs of Mrs. Laetitia Pilkington.
This book's full title, with its reference to a Search after Happiness, sounds like a possible source for Sarah Fielding
's David Simple, whose hero is depicted in Search of a Real Friend...
Literary responses
Lady Caroline Lamb
When Glenarvon first appeared, said Lady Caroline, William Lamb
admired it so much that it was instrumental in bringing the separated couple back together.
Morgan, Sydney Owenson, Lady. Lady Morgan’s Memoirs. Editors Dixon, William Hepworth and Geraldine Jewsbury, AMS Press, 1975, 2 vols.
2: 202
Joanna Baillie
discerned its author's ability, but added, Her...
Literary responses
Delarivier Manley
Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
commented on the flyleaf of her copy: true & well wrote.
