Full Description
The plot of Charlotte Smith's autobiographical first novel Emmeline (1788) includes the usual thrills of the eighteenth-century courtship novel: abduction, duels, and a "fairy tale princess." At the same time, the novel satirically reworks such literary conventions by focusing on the dangers of early engagement and marriage, and challenges a social and legal system in which woment are inherently illegitimate subjects.
The Broadview edition includes primary source material relating to the novel's reception; women, marriage and work; and landscape in eighteenth-century fiction. Mary Hays's biographical writing on Smith is also included, as is selected correspondence.
Contents
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Charlotte Smith: A Brief Chronology
A Note on the Text
Emmeline
Appendix A: The Reception of Emmeline
Anonymous, The Critical Review, June 1788
Mary Wollstonecraft, The Analytical Review, July 1788
Anonymous, The Monthly Review, September 1788
Anonymous, The European Magazine, November 1788
Jane Austen, "The History of England," 1791
Walter Scott, The Lives of the Novelists, 1821
Egerton Brydges, "Memoirs of Mrs. Charlotte Smith," January 1807
Appendix B: Women, Marriage, Work
Mary Collier,"The Woman's Labour: An Epistle to Mr Stephen Duck," 1731
Edmund Burke,"On Delicacy," 1757
Hester Chapone,"On Politeness and Accomplishments," 1773
John Gregory,"Marriage," 1774
Mary Wollstonecraft,"Matrimony," 1787
Appendix C: Landscapes
Thomas Gray, "Journal in the Lakes," 8 October 1769
William Gilpin, Observations on the River Wye, 1770
Appendix D: Life
Letter from Charlotte Smith to Thomas Cadell, 14 January 1788
Letter from Charlotte Smith to William Hayley, 1788-89
Mary Hays,"Mrs. Charlotte Smith," British Public Characters, 1800-1801
Select Bibliography
