Friday, May 27, 2011

Eliza Haywood, Remarkable 18th Century Author
by Guest Blogger Kat Aubrey

Eliza Haywood (c. 1693-1756) was one of the first English novelists. Yet she is not at all as well known as the male authors who followed her, those who wrote what are widely considered some of the first English novels--for example, Samuel Richardson's Pamela (1740) and Clarissa (1748), or Henry Fielding's Tom Jones (1749). In fact,
"William B. Warner has argued that Richardson and Fielding set out rather consciously to disavow, absorb yet erase, and obliterate their female predecessors, including Haywood, whose work is essential to the history of the novel. Feminist critics including Margaret Doody, Jane Spencer, and Ros Ballaster give her credit for initiating major forms of the novel [and] key character types." (Oxford DNB)
Haywood's earliest novels are perhaps best classed as 'amatory fiction'--sexy, daring tales of adventure in the bedroom and the streets--which is perhaps another reason why they have not until recently received as much attention, acclaim, or study as the more formal, serious novels by her male contemporaries. However, she wrote in many genres, crafting plays, poetry, literary criticism, political essays and conduct books as well as novels. She even translated a number of works from the continent, and founded several periodicals aimed at an educated female audience. With all these ventures, it is not surprise that her tone ranged widely, too. For example, by the 1750s, her books were more moralistic and domestic, and rather less titillating, in tone.

Fortunately, Haywood's oeuvre has indeed experienced a renaissance in the past few decades, and many of her books are back in print. And they are most worthy of our attention. Not only are they well-crafted, entertaining, exciting stories, but they give us insight into the lives, tastes, ideals, and social structures of the 18th-century woman. She was certainly well-known and well-read in her day: she and the earlier women authors Aphra Behn (1640-1689) and Delarivier Manley (c. 1670-1724) were known by the mid-18th century as the 'Fair Triumvirate of Wit.' Haywood was truly
"a professional woman author--she lived by her pen, as the saying goes--writing popular fiction, and it was very popular." (Introduction, The History of Miss Betsy Thoughtless, 7)
Haywood's books are the sort of thing that the grandmothers and mothers of Regency women may have read, and perhaps passed down to (or hid from) their daughters. They are the precursors to the novels of such Regency and Victorian luminaries as Jane Austen, Fanny Burney, Mary Shelley, George Eliot, Elizabeth Gaskell, and the Brontë sisters.
"As Christopher Flint remarked, 'Haywood, more than any other eighteenth-century writer ... bridges the fictional narratives of Behn or Defoe and the works of Burney and Austen' (Family Fictions, 219)." (Oxford DNB)
Love in Excess; or, the Fatal Inquiry, published in three parts in 1719-1720, was Haywood's first novel. It draws influence from French romances and develops those themes into a romp filled with vibrant, surprising characters. The protagonist is D'Elmont, a gentleman who is in fact fairly gentlemanly, and numerous women, all quite remarkable--Amena, Alovisa, Melantha, Ciamara, Camilla, Violetta and the superior Melliora--through whom Haywood explores conceptions of feminine and sexual identity. These ladies and their suitors go through a host of adventures, misadventures, affairs, and intrigues that are both charmingly fun... and cleverly complex.
"[B]luntly, it is a bodice ripper. It is also an emotionally charged soap opera of brutal ambition, adulterous passion, and abuses of power. Again, it is a cautionary young-adult novel tracing the love-lives of impressionable young women in a violent, male-dominated world. ... Any novelist would kill to write a novel with such broad appeal." (Introduction, Love in Excess, 23)
The History of Miss Betsy Thoughtless, published in 1751, is quite a different novel. It follows the not-too-subtly-named heroine through wayward girlhood, problematic marriage, and finally wise(r) maturity. It is a fiction that is also a conduct manual for girls pondering their own marriages--but it is also entertaining in its way, with multiple plotlines and an ensemble cast of characters who are mere types on the surface but actually illuminate the nature of those types. And, read critically, it also serves as a cautionary tale:
"the story of an intelligent, independent, wilful woman discovering the full force of the disciplining, transforming forces that create the subdued woman for whom society's gendered commands become willed behaviour." (Oxford DNB)
Haywood's Fantomina: or, Love in a Maze (1725), a novella, is rather more ambiguous than either of these two novels, and in its interplay of adventure and didacticism it is, I think, the most interesting example of her fiction. Its heroine decides to try living like those other, scandalous women do, and puts on a series of disguises in order to do so (wealthy courtesan, country maid, recent widow). She finds pleasure but also learns unpleasant lessons, as when she seduces her lover in each of her disguises and receives his letters to each persona, all of which plainly illustrates his cheating ways. There is a moral of sorts to the story, and yet the ambiguities remain; it is a fascinating portrait of the contradictory standards women were socially expected to live up to. Fantomina exemplifies Haywood's belief that
"the most interesting and instructive stories occur when passion is intensified sufficiently to overcome prudence." (Introduction, Fantomina and Other Works, 16)
Haywood herself is almost as much of an enigma as Fantomina (indeed, "female authorship was widely considered to be the literary equivalent of prostitution" [Introduction, Fantomina and Other Works, 9]). There is not a great deal known about her life, at least not in comparison with her contemporaries Fielding and Richardson; the most widely disseminated tidbit about her is that she was mocked by Alexander Pope in his Dunciad (1728). But we must remember that
"[t]hough we now know little about the private woman behind [her] conspicuous success, our ignorance is not proof of her obscurity. ... Haywood was solidly enmeshed in the literary scene of her day." (Introduction, Love in Excess, 8)
She was born in Shropshire, married early (her maiden name was Eliza Fowler) and widowed probably by 1719/20, then lived with the poet Richard Savage, by whom she had a child. Beginning in 1724, she lived with William Hatchett, a bookseller and playwright, and had a son with him. She was an actress as well as author: her career on the stage began in 1715. While she began to write fiction in 1719, she continued to act for another two decades. Haywood was a vigorous and brilliant women whose prolific output in all kinds of literary and dramatic fields is incredible. She was active in other ways, too: she participated strenuously in politics, to the point of being brought in for questioning over her statements. She was a truly remarkable woman whose experimental and unconventional life and works are well worth reading as precedents of and precursors to the women authors, and women readers, of the later 18th and the 19th century.

Sources:
-- Paula R. Backscheider, 'Haywood, Eliza (1693?–1756),' Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford University Press, 2004); online edn, Sept 2010. [link]
-- Eliza Haywood, Fantomina and Other Works, ed. Alexander Pettit, Margaret Case Croskery, and Anna C. Patchias (Broadview Press, 2004). [link]
-- Eliza Haywood, The History of Miss Betsy Thoughtless, ed. Christine Blouch (Broadview Press, 1998). [link]
-- Eliza Haywood, Love in Excess, ed. David Oakleaf (Broadview Press, 2000); 2nd edn. [link]
-- Haywood's Wikipedia page [link] has a list of her major works and a list of resources, including a modern biography.

~*~

Kat Aubrey is a historical fantasy writer and artist who currently spends most of her time being an English literature grad student. She's interested in 11th-12th and 18th-19th century England, gender studies, and modern subcultures like steampunk. Her Regency fashion drawings can be viewed in her art gallery, and she talks about her inspirations on her blog, The Minx's Farrago.

Friday, May 20, 2011

The Party's Over --
The end of the Peace Celebrations 1814

All good things come to an end. After the Royal Wedding of two weeks ago, there was a massive clean-up to be done in London. Following the Olympic Games, wherever they are held, there are buildings to let, decorations to sell, and work to be done to return things to normal.

In the same way, after the Peace Celebrations of 1814, there was a huge amount of work to do to return London's parks to their more usual green and pleasant appearance. Hyde Park was home to the 'Jubilee Fair', troop reviews, triumphal processions, and a reenactment of the Battle of Trafalgar.


St. James Park hosted a seven-story Chinese Pagoda atop a decorative bridge, which in the evening caught fire and burned. The Battle of the Nile was reenacted there on the Canal. There were also display buildings. One of these, a handsome, octagonal affair designed by Nash, eventually went to Woolwich to become a public building.


Green Park had been home to the Castle of Discord which transformed on August 1, courtesy of Sir William Congreve, to the Temple of Concorde (designed by John Nash). There were numerous other buildings, display spaces and the like, and splendid fireworks.

By mid-August it was all over. And on October 16, 1814 an auction was held, in the Green Park, to sell off all the left-overs from the celebrations. I found this account of the auction in "The Literary Panorama, and National Register" for 1814, and I think it makes fascinating reading.

The Temple of Concord, and other preparations used in the late public rejoicings for the peace, were sold by auction. The first day's sale fetched 198l.6s.6d for 100 lots. The second day's sale was of 99 lots. The following are some of the prices obtained.

The sale commenced with the flag staff, on the top of the Upper Temple. The brokers viewed it as a common piece of fir, which might be converted into excellent firewood, and it was knocked down at 14s. Four rainbows, in spite of the scriptural allusions which they drew forth, produced only 4l. 3s. Eight Vestals were sold for 14l. 8s. Eight pair of Ionic columns, coloured to imitate Sienna marble, produced 21l. 8s. 6d. The Doric columns of which there were sixteen pair, painted in imitation of porphyry, averaged 1l. 12s6d. per pair. The four pyramidical pillars (shaped like cannon), ornamenting the corners of the first platform, were purchased by an individual, with all their appurtenances, for 16l. 9s.

The mechanical fountains, which are eight in number, sold for 10l. 16s.

How odd, and rather sad, to see the objects that had delighted so many and held such symbolism, reduced to being sold for firewood. I wonder what the purchasers did with the rainbows, and the Vestals. I could imagine the Vestals decorating some dandy's sitting room!

The sale continued with cornices, door-ways and such with inscriptions "on which Mr. Creaton sported many patriotic remarks". Here's a sample, both of the signs, and the prices they fetched:

The Regency   7 s.
Peace returning    7 s.
Europe rescued   8 s.
Strife descending    8 s.
The triumph of Britannia     2 l.10 s.
The Regent and Wellington     3 l.
The arms of England and France  2 l. 2 s.

The article ends as follows: "The sale of the exterior of the Temple of Concord concluded at five o'clock.
It produced the gross sum of 200l. 2s. 6d. What was the prime cost of materials?"

That's always the question, isn't it? How much does it cost to provide the people with "circuses". Is it value for money? And how do we cope when it's all over? Do the memories linger and delight? Or is there only the jaded sense of money and time wasted?


I personally believe in modest celebrations without waste of resources. Certainly the auction above recouped some expenses. But of course they had to do it all again, in 1815, after Waterloo.

Next week, guest blogger Kat Aubrey will be here, writing about a wildly popular female novelist of the 18th century, a woman whose novels would have been well known to the mothers of Regency ladies, and perhaps passed on by them to their daughters. Kat is a historical fantasy writer and artist who currently spends most of her time being an English literature grad student. She's interested in 11th-12th and 18th-19th century England, gender studies, and modern subcultures like steampunk. Her Regency fashion drawings can be viewed in her art gallery, and she talks about her inspirations on her blog, The Minx's Farrago.

'Til next time,

Lesley-Anne

Friday, May 13, 2011

A note about William Henry Ireland--a Regency hoax

Hello all-- Blogger was down yesterday and though my new post was saved and scheduled, it was lost. So my post on the aftermath of the Peace Celebrations of 1814 is somewhere in the ether. I don't have time to redo it in the next couple of days, so it will have to wait for next week.

I do apologize for the lack of a post, but I offer you a Regency name and a fascinating story for you to pursue about a remarkable hoax: William Henry Ireland 1775-1835

As author Doug Stewart, in his book "The Boy Who Would be Shakespeare" put it "William-Henry Ireland committed the greatest Shakespeare hoax ever--and fooled even himself into believing he was the bard's true literary heir".

Read about William-Henry Ireland here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Henry_Ireland
and at the Smithsonian magazine here
and in the book "Literary Hoaxes" by Melissa Katsoulis--an interesting little volume.


































'Til next time,
Blogger willing....

Lesley-Anne

P.S. Blogger has come through with the post I thought was lost--watch for it next Friday!

The Party's Over --
The end of the Peace Celebrations 1814

All good things come to an end. After the Royal Wedding of two weeks ago, there was a massive clean-up to be done in London. Following the Olympic Games, wherever they are held, there are buildings to let, decorations to sell, and work to be done to return things to normal.



In the same way, after the Peace Celebrations of 1814, there was a huge amount of work to do to return London's parks to their more usual green and pleasant appearance.

Hyde Park was home to the 'Jubilee Fair', troop reviews, triumphal processions, and a reenactment of the Battle of Trafalgar.








St. James Park hosted a seven-story Chinese Pagoda atop a decorative bridge, which in the evening caught fire and burned. The Battle of the Nile was reenacted there on the Canal. There were also display buildings. One of these, a handsome, octagonal affair designed by Nash, eventually went to Woolwich to become a public building.








Green Park had been home to the Castle of Discord which transformed on August 1, courtesy of Sir William Congreve, to the Temple of Concorde (designed by John Nash). There were numerous other buildings, display spaces and the like, and splendid fireworks.



By mid-August it was all over. And on October 16, 1814 an auction was held, in the Green Park, to sell off all the left-overs from the celebrations. I found this account of the auction in "The Literary Panorama, and National Register" for 1814, and I think it makes fascinating reading.




The Temple of Concord, and other preparations used in the late public rejoicings for the peace, were sold by auction. The first day's sale fetched 198l.6s.6d for 100 lots. The second day's sale was of 99 lots. The following are some of the prices obtained.



The sale commenced with the flag staff, on the top of the Upper Temple. The brokers viewed it as a common piece of fir, which might be converted into excellent firewood, and it was knocked down at 14s. Four rainbows, in spite of the scriptural allusions which they drew forth, produced only 4l. 3s. Eight Vestals were sold for 14l. 8s. Eight pair of Ionic columns, coloured to imitate Sienna marble, produced 21l. 8s. 6d. The Doric columns of which there were sixteen pair, painted in imitation of porphyry, averaged 1l. 12s6d. per pair. The four pyramidical pillars (shaped like cannon), ornamenting the corners of the first platform, were purchased by an individual, with all their appurtenances, for 16l. 9s.




The mechanical fountains, which are eight in number, sold for 10l. 16s.



How odd, and rather sad, to see the objects that had delighted so many and held such symbolism, reduced to being sold for firewood. I wonder what the purchasers did with the rainbows, and the Vestals. I could imagine the Vestals decorating some dandy's sitting room!



The sale continued with cornices, door-ways and such with inscriptions "on which Mr. Creaton sported many patriotic remarks". Here's a sample, both of the signs, and the prices they fetched:




The Regency   7 s.

Peace returning    7 s.

Europe rescued   8 s.

Strife descending    8 s.

The triumph of Britannia     2 l.10 s.

The Regent and Wellington     3 l.

The arms of England and France  2 l. 2 s.




The article ends as follows:
"The sale of the exterior of the Temple of Concord concluded at five o'clock.

It produced the gross sum of 200l. 2s. 6d. What was the prime cost of materials?"



That's always the question, isn't it? How much does it cost to provide the people with "circuses". Is it value for money? And how do we cope when it's all over? Do the memories linger and delight? Or is there only the jaded sense of money and time wasted?








I personally believe in modest celebrations without waste of resources. Certainly the auction above recouped some expenses. But of course they had to do it all again, in 1815, after Waterloo.



'Til next time,



Lesley-Anne


Friday, May 6, 2011

Weymouth -- Princess Charlotte's Refuge

1814 was a difficult year for Princess Charlotte, daughter of the Prince Regent, heir to the throne of Great Britain. She had agreed, unwillingly, to wed the Prince of Orange; she had fallen in love with an unsuitable Prussian prince; her mother Caroline, Princess of Wales, was leaving the country--and her--for life on the continent; and her father had her virtually imprisoned in Cranbourne Lodge at Windsor.

But in August, things improved--she was permitted to go to the seaside, which doctors had recommended for her health. She wanted to visit Brighton, but her father chose Weymouth, long a royal seaside favourite and a goodly distance from his summer home.


The Duke of Gloucester had first wintered there in 1780 and had built a fine house, Gloucester Lodge. George III visited, and bought the house from his brother in 1789 and spent the following fourteen summers in Weymouth. The Lodge became the royal home-from-home for various of the Princesses, and it was there that Princess Charlotte arrived in August, and she stayed until December!

In his 1840's book The Spas of England, author A. B. Granville, declared that the town's situation--facing east--was a great detractor, and that it really was not suitable for patients being subject to east winds. He does however admit that the Esplanade is "one of the finest marine promenades I have seen in England". The Esplanade was about a mile long and it faced the fine sand beach which stretched for two miles in an arc.

John Constable painted the bay in 1816.


But it was the town that interested Princess Charlotte and, starved of company as she was, the people visiting there. Gloucester Lodge was situated on the Esplanade in the midst of the Georgian terraces and residences which still line it.


In 1815, A Guide to all the Watering and Sea-Bathing Places was published, and it devoted some ten pages to the delights of Weymouth:
"...by rapid enlargements, and many elegant buildings, it has now become a very respectable place, with a population of 4000 souls. The most fashionable residences are, the Royal Terrace, Gloucester-row, Chesterfield-place, etc., etc. These being in the vicinity of the rooms, the libraries, and the theatre, and commanding extensive views, both by sea and land, are held in general estimation by strangers as well as natives."
Sea-bathing was recommended--"immersion in the briny flood is safe and delightful". There were some forty bathing-machines "in constant requisition from six in the morning till noon". In addition there was a hot salt-water bath in the centre of town for use "in many cases of human infirmity" at the cost of 3s.6d per session.

There was one theatre which held upwards of four hundred spectators: "The house is elegantly fitted up, and the performers are frequently of the first order of merit." The public rooms were in Gloucester-row, owned by a Mr. Russel:
"The Assembly-room is lofty, light, and spacious, and very handsomely decorated, as well as delightfully situated. The master of the cermonies is Mr. Rodber..."

Among the regulations which Mr. Rodber instituted were:

1. That Gentlemen are not to appear in the rooms, either on Tuesday or Friday evenings, in boots; nor Ladies in riding-habits.

II. That the ball shall begin as soon as possible after seven o-clock, and finish precisely at eleven.

IV. That no Lady or Gentleman can be permitted to dance in coloured gloves.

V. That no tea-table be carried into the card-room.

VII. That Gentlemen will be pleased to leave their swords at the door.

The terms of subscription were not cheap--one pound for a single transferable ticket.

Wood's Library and Hervey's Library served the public; one had a card room in addition to its reading material, the other rented musical instruments as well as books. Hervey's Library additionally hosted the post-office with daily delivery to and from London. The Church of St. Mary is deemed, by the author of the guide, inadequate to its congregation and without interest to antiquarians but is considered to have a good organ "erected here in 1806, by voluntary subscription" and is much praised for its singing and music.

The town was well stocked with hotels, lodging houses and boarding houses, though "the price, though in some measure regulated by the number of rooms, is high." At the boarding houses--Scriven's on the Esplanade and Clark's in St. Mary-street--the terms are three guineas per week. Some inns and taverns are rated as 'good houses': the King's Head Inn, the Crown Inn, and the Golden Lion.


Princess Charlotte, accustomed to solitude and inactivity, must have been overwhelmed by the delights on offer. If one cared to walk, there was always the Esplanade, but also the nearby town of Melcombe Regis, connected by a bridge to Weymouth: "from thence along the Quay to the end of the New Pier, is an amusing saunter, replete with variety." There was a Camera Obscura near the Look-out on the bay, and the ruins of Sandsfoot Castle not so far away.

And then there were the 'Aquatic Excursions':
"Sailing and fishing in the bay is a frequent and pleasant amusement at Weymouth, and for this every facility is furnished by the industrious and obliging boatmen of the place."

Portland, with its seven villages, castle ruins, cavern, light-house and quarries was additionally a site of interest for visitors to Weymouth:
"about four miles from Weymouth, is commonly called an island, but is, properly speaking, a peninsula, as it joins the main land by an isthmus composed of a ridge of pebbles."

Princess Charlotte must have seen it all--she was in the vicinity for five months, and it was probably the most carefree period of her life. She had the intention to return for the people loved her; she was regarded as the queen who would redeem the monarchy. There were illuminations on her arrival in the town displaying, in the center, the motto:
Hail Princess Charlotte,
Europe's Hope and Britain's Glory

How could one not enjoy oneself with an adoring public, a host of entertainments--and an unprecedented degree of freedom to enjoy them? The following summer she was betrothed to the Prince of Saxe-Coburg, in 1816 she was wed, and in November of 1817, she died. I hope she made the most of her months in Weymouth--she deserved all the enjoyment it could offer.

'Til next time,

Lesley-Anne