Kathryn Hughes
Hasty Scrawls
Harriet Martineau, Selected Letters
By Valerie Sanders (ed)
OUP 268pp £30
The nineteenth-century journalist and novelist Harriet Martineau insisted that her letters should never be published, begging the recipients of her correspondence to throw away the incriminating evidence as quickly as possible. It wasn't that she was ashamed of them - in fact, she thought them rather good but, as she explained to the diarist Henry Crabb Robinson, 'I could no more write freely to anyone who persisted in laying by my letters, than I could talk freely to one who insisted on taking notes of my conversation.' Far from being literary affairs - measured, polished, and written with one eye on posterity - Martineau's letters represent quick staccatos of conversation exchanged without ceremony or artifice. In this most comprehensive publication of her letters to date, compiled with the permission and approval of her family, Valerie Sanders makes use of the fact that many of Martineau's correspondents dared to keep her letters - as secret souvenirs, perhaps, of one of the most celebrated women of the day.
When her merchant father lost his fortune in the mid-1820s, the young Harriet Martineau was obliged to seek her own support. Her deafness prevented her from following her sisters down the governess route, and she concentrated instead on developing her skills as a journalist, starting with contributions to the Unitarian
Sign Up to our newsletter
Receive free articles, highlights from the archive, news, details of prizes, and much more.@Lit_Review
Follow Literary Review on Twitter
Twitter Feed
London's East End was long synonymous with poverty and sweatshops, while its West End was associated with glamour and high society. But when it came to the fashion industry, were the differences really so profound?
Sharman Kadish - Winkle-pickers & Bum Freezers
Sharman Kadish: Winkle-pickers & Bum Freezers - Fashion City: How Jewish Londoners Shaped Global Style; Fashion City: ...
literaryreview.co.uk
In 1982, Donald Rumsfeld presented Saddam Hussein with a pair of golden spurs. Two decades later he was dropping bunker-busting bombs on his palaces.
Where did the US-Iraqi relationship go wrong?
Rory Mccarthy - The Case of the Vanishing Missiles
Rory Mccarthy: The Case of the Vanishing Missiles - The Achilles Trap: Saddam Hussein, the United States and the ...
literaryreview.co.uk
Barbara Comyns was a dog breeder, a house painter, a piano restorer, a landlady... And a novelist.
@nclarke14 on the lengths 20th-century women writers had to go to make ends meet:
Norma Clarke - Her Family & Other Animals
Norma Clarke: Her Family & Other Animals - Barbara Comyns: A Savage Innocence by Avril Horner
literaryreview.co.uk