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Winner of the Prize for Independent Scholars from the Modern Language AssociationNotable Book of the Year from The New York Times Daughter of pioneer feminist Mary Wollstonecraft and radical philosopher William Godwin, lover and wife of Percy Bysshe Shelley, author of Frankenstein and creator of the science fiction genre, Mary Shelley has remained a figure both undervalued and enigmatic. In this authoritative, ground-breaking biography, she is finally restored to her rightful stature as one of the major figures in English literary history. Here for the first time is a full account of Mary Shelley's career, significant areas of which have never before been examined: her precocious childhood, her adolescent liaison with the radical poet Shelley, her creation of Frankenstein at the age of nineteen, her tempestuous but brilliant married years with Shelley, and, of particular note, the dramatic second half of her life, after Shelley's death. Emily Sunstein has also discovered previously unknown works written by Mary Shelley and traces the development of her unjustly clouded posthumous reputation.
This book explores the significant textual relationship between Mary and Percy Shelley and the early works of the Brontë siblings. Through a detailed examination of the Shelleyan narrative accessible to the Brontës from their childhood to their final novels, this study argues for a fresh perspective on the Brontës' engagement with the Shelleys in both their juvenilia and later seven novels. In this respect, the book considers the Brontës as readers rather than exclusively as writers, viewing them as a product of the early nineteenth-century literary marketplace which maintained affinities to Romanticism. Reading, rewriting, and appropriating the textual Shelleys was a fundamental vein stemming the Brontës’ writing from childhood, with Mary epitomising the model for what the sisters would eventually become: the female novelist.
Romanticism and the Letter is a collection of essays that explore various aspects of letter writing in the Romantic period of British Literature. Although the correspondence of the Romantics constitutes a major literary achievement in its own right, it has received relatively little critical attention. Essays focus on the letters of major poets, including Wordsworth, Byron, Shelley and Keats; novelists and prose writers, including Jane Austen, Leigh Hunt and Charles Lamb; and lesser-known writers such as Melesina Trench and Mary Leadbeater. Moving from theories of letter writing, through the period’s diverse epistolary culture, to essays on individual writers, the collection opens new perspectives for students and scholars of the Romantic period.
***AS READ ON BBC RADIO 4*** NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD WINNER 'A gripping account of the heartbreaks and triumphs of two of history's most formidable female intellectuals, Mary Wollstonecraft and Mary Shelley. Gordon has reunited mother and daughter through biography, beautifully weaving their narratives for the first time.' Amanda Foreman English feminist Mary Wollstonecraft and author Mary Shelley were mother and daughter, yet these two extraordinary women never knew one another. Nevertheless, their passionate and pioneering lives remained closely intertwined, their choices, dreams and tragedies eerily similar. Both women became famous writers and wrote books that changed literary...
Each volume in this series provides an introduction tracing the subject author's critical reputation, trends in interpretation, developments in textual and biographical scholarship, and reprints of selected essays and reviews, beginning with the author's contemporaries and continuing through to current scholarship. Many volumes also feature new essays by leading scholars and critics, specially commissioned for the series.
In the second decade of the nineteenth century, the British press began a campaign of critical abuse against Leigh Hunt, caricaturing the radical journalist as an upstart "Cockney" author whose literary talents were as disreputable as his politics. Lord Byron, on the other hand, was revered as a peer and a poetical genius who, the conservative press argued, would never befriend and collaborate with a writer like Hunt. Yet Byron did just that. Byron, Hunt, and the Politics of Literary Engagement is the first full-length study of the friendship and literary relationship of two of the most important second-generation Romantic authors. Challenging long-held critical attitudes, this study shows that Byron and Hunt engaged in a creative and meaningful dialogue at each major stage in their careers, from their earliest published volumes of juvenile poetry and verse satire to their most celebrated contributions to Romantic literature: The Story of Rimini and Don Juan. Drawing upon newly recovered letters and unpublished manuscript material, this book illuminates the surprisingly durable and artistically significant friendship of Lord Byron and Leigh Hunt.
Argues that contemporary female Gothic novels of death can, in fact, breathe new life into feminist debates about victimization, essentialism, agency, and the body.
These eight volumes contain the works of Mary Shelley and include introductions and prefatory notes to each volume. Included in this edition are "Frankenstein" (1818), "Matilda" ((1819), "Valperga" (1823), "The Last Man" (1826), "Perkin Warbeck" (1830) and "Lodore" (1835).
A Mary Shelley Chronology covers in detail the three main stages of her extraordinary life: her childhood as daughter of two of the best known radical writers of their age - Mary Wollstonecraft and William Godwin; the travels, losses, tensions and creative achievement of her time with Percy Bysshe Shelley from 1814 and her long widowhood from 1822 and her later works. This chronology follows all these experiences and activities, the genesis and publication history of her writings, her travels, friendships and intimate relationships with several other major figures of the Romantic period.
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