| This blog explores social attitudes in Jane Austen's time, discusses her novels, reviews forgotten 18th century novels, and throws some occasional shade at the modern academy. The introductory post is here. My "six simple questions for academics" post is here. |
CMP#190: Down the rabbit hole with Eliza Kirkham Mathews
I often get caught up on researching whatever I can find about the authoresses I write about. Here are some miscellaneous bits of information about Eliza Kirkham Mathews, nee Strong, whose novel, What Has Been (1801), I discuss here. Eliza's tragic personal story is reflected in her novel. We know her story from the memoir of her husband, the 19th century celebrity actor Charles Mathews, written by his second wife.
Revisions on the fly?
After helping Eliza get What Has Been ready for the press, Eliza’s husband's brother wrote: “I hope to hear of her success as an author; but she must allow me to suggest, that if she wishes to be eminent, she must not write quite in such as hurry as she has been accustomed to do… let me recommend her to write every one of her productions over at least twice, and very carefully to correct the little inaccuracies which will escape even the most experienced eye... there are not more than one or two [successful writers] who ever have sent any of their productions into the world without a revisal at the least, and that not by barely reading them over, but by re-writing them."
I spotted evidence of some revisions on the fly which were not tidied up in What Has Been. While the heroine Emily is staying with the St. Ives family, Mrs. St. Ives asks some visitors if they have “observed a tall and rather handsome woman, who appears extremely melancholy, is always dressed in black, and walks frequently beneath the western cliffs?” One of the visitors declares that she is “the wife of my valued friend, Wilford Stanley,” and he offers to introduce her. It’s clear there is a backstory coming: “she is separated, perhaps for ever, from a husband whom she loves almost to adoration.” But we never hear again of Mrs. Stanley or her backstory. When we meet the woman haunting the cliffs, she is a madwoman, the discarded mistress of a Jamaican planter. Therefore, Agatha is not someone you'd introduce to respectable ladies. It looks like Mathews started a storyline, changed it, and never went back and revised this introduction of the woman on the cliff.
After helping Eliza get What Has Been ready for the press, Eliza’s husband's brother wrote: “I hope to hear of her success as an author; but she must allow me to suggest, that if she wishes to be eminent, she must not write quite in such as hurry as she has been accustomed to do… let me recommend her to write every one of her productions over at least twice, and very carefully to correct the little inaccuracies which will escape even the most experienced eye... there are not more than one or two [successful writers] who ever have sent any of their productions into the world without a revisal at the least, and that not by barely reading them over, but by re-writing them."
I spotted evidence of some revisions on the fly which were not tidied up in What Has Been. While the heroine Emily is staying with the St. Ives family, Mrs. St. Ives asks some visitors if they have “observed a tall and rather handsome woman, who appears extremely melancholy, is always dressed in black, and walks frequently beneath the western cliffs?” One of the visitors declares that she is “the wife of my valued friend, Wilford Stanley,” and he offers to introduce her. It’s clear there is a backstory coming: “she is separated, perhaps for ever, from a husband whom she loves almost to adoration.” But we never hear again of Mrs. Stanley or her backstory. When we meet the woman haunting the cliffs, she is a madwoman, the discarded mistress of a Jamaican planter. Therefore, Agatha is not someone you'd introduce to respectable ladies. It looks like Mathews started a storyline, changed it, and never went back and revised this introduction of the woman on the cliff.
Children's books
EKM also authored or compiled some inexpensive children's books with a publisher in York during her final illness.
In Ellinor, or the Young Governess, Eliza re-used some of her poems. She also wove in the true story of her relatives Maria and Emily (actually Sarah Amelia) Strong who both died young and somewhat mysteriously. As they were getting ready for a ball, Emily "complained of a violent pain in her stomach," and collapsed and died. (Appendicitis, maybe)? Three days later, as Emily's body was being carried downstairs for burial, Maria "uttered a piercing shriek and instantly expired in the arms of her mother." "The eldest had not attained her eighteenth year, when she died." The moral, as given by the governess, is to be good and virtuous so as to be prepared if death strikes suddenly.
The themes of Ellinor--heartbreaking family loss, the need to earn a living, and resignation to the will of God--are the same as in What Has Been. The book is the usual didactic and moral fare for young children. A naughty boy dies, after expressing repentance for his disobedience. The story of the plucky young governess is interspersed with instructions and moral tales which are cribbed from other books, which is something I've seen before in another children's book.
The language is more formal and old-fashioned In The Anecdotes of the Clairville Family, with Johnsonian cadences ("Walking is a natural exercise; riding an artificial one"). The prose doesn't sound like our emotional, sentimental Eliza, and reads as though it was written at least thirty years before 1802. A poem recited by one of the children is not one of Eliza's, but was written by Frances Sheridan: "Ode to Patience." The Clairville Family follows the format of books of this type--there is a brief narrative to link together the dialogues of an invented family in which useful facts are given in lecture form by a wise adult to grateful and attentive children: (“O Mamma,” said Charles, “how many wonderful things you are acquainted with! how did you attain so much knowledge?”) I think the entire text is cribbed from other sources.
EKM also authored or compiled some inexpensive children's books with a publisher in York during her final illness.
In Ellinor, or the Young Governess, Eliza re-used some of her poems. She also wove in the true story of her relatives Maria and Emily (actually Sarah Amelia) Strong who both died young and somewhat mysteriously. As they were getting ready for a ball, Emily "complained of a violent pain in her stomach," and collapsed and died. (Appendicitis, maybe)? Three days later, as Emily's body was being carried downstairs for burial, Maria "uttered a piercing shriek and instantly expired in the arms of her mother." "The eldest had not attained her eighteenth year, when she died." The moral, as given by the governess, is to be good and virtuous so as to be prepared if death strikes suddenly.
The themes of Ellinor--heartbreaking family loss, the need to earn a living, and resignation to the will of God--are the same as in What Has Been. The book is the usual didactic and moral fare for young children. A naughty boy dies, after expressing repentance for his disobedience. The story of the plucky young governess is interspersed with instructions and moral tales which are cribbed from other books, which is something I've seen before in another children's book.
The language is more formal and old-fashioned In The Anecdotes of the Clairville Family, with Johnsonian cadences ("Walking is a natural exercise; riding an artificial one"). The prose doesn't sound like our emotional, sentimental Eliza, and reads as though it was written at least thirty years before 1802. A poem recited by one of the children is not one of Eliza's, but was written by Frances Sheridan: "Ode to Patience." The Clairville Family follows the format of books of this type--there is a brief narrative to link together the dialogues of an invented family in which useful facts are given in lecture form by a wise adult to grateful and attentive children: (“O Mamma,” said Charles, “how many wonderful things you are acquainted with! how did you attain so much knowledge?”) I think the entire text is cribbed from other sources.
Two books about quadrupeds and birds are largely cribbed from Oliver Goldsmith's Natural History with prints done by Thomas Bewick. What we would call straight-up plagiarism was common in this time when compiling educational books for children.
These children's titles went into several editions and received approving reviews. Incidentally, these books were also offered for sale by MJ Godwin Juvenile Library, the company owned by the philosopher William Godwin, husband of Mary Wollstonecraft. However, Eliza was probably paid very little for writing and/or compiling them.
The books re-used wood block prints created by Bewick for his publications. Thus, an engraving in the Anecdotes of the Clairville Family, supposedly showing a man dying, attended by his sister, is actually taken from the "Fable of Sloth and Industry," which explains why a naked woman is in the middle of the death-bed scene. She represents Sloth.
These children's titles went into several editions and received approving reviews. Incidentally, these books were also offered for sale by MJ Godwin Juvenile Library, the company owned by the philosopher William Godwin, husband of Mary Wollstonecraft. However, Eliza was probably paid very little for writing and/or compiling them.
The books re-used wood block prints created by Bewick for his publications. Thus, an engraving in the Anecdotes of the Clairville Family, supposedly showing a man dying, attended by his sister, is actually taken from the "Fable of Sloth and Industry," which explains why a naked woman is in the middle of the death-bed scene. She represents Sloth.
Charles Mathews and his second wife in more prosperous times in London. She was known for her pretty little feet, which she is showing off here with the help of her dog's leash. Critical Appraisal
Charles Mathews' second wife wasn't complimentary about her predecessor's writing abilities, Eliza's novel What Has Been, did garner some reviews. The Critical Review thought that What Has Been (1801) owed too much to Charlotte Smith’s 1796 novel Marchmont (which I haven't read, so I couldn't say) "‘What has been’?—It is rather what has been already told; for we trace our author too closely in the footsteps of her predecessors... scarcely a single event is new. The wild insanity of the lady at Teignmouth has numerous prototypes… On the whole, independent of the want of novelty, we think the present work neither peculiarly interesting nor pleasing."
The Monthly Mirror was kinder: “one of the most promising efforts of the kind we have lately witnessed. The story appears to be founded upon real occurrences… the incidents are rapid and interesting… and the sentiments are uniformly creditable to the moral and religious principles of their author.”
The second Mrs. Mathews was admittedly a more successful author. The multi-volume Memoirs of Charles Mathews, which featured a lot of his correspondence and anecdotes from his life on the stage, was in print through the 19th century, a measure of the comic actor's enduring fame in England.
The Dictionary of National Biography mentions EKM in their entry for Charles Mathews as “the author of a volume of poems and some unsuccessful novels.”
Charles Mathews' second wife wasn't complimentary about her predecessor's writing abilities, Eliza's novel What Has Been, did garner some reviews. The Critical Review thought that What Has Been (1801) owed too much to Charlotte Smith’s 1796 novel Marchmont (which I haven't read, so I couldn't say) "‘What has been’?—It is rather what has been already told; for we trace our author too closely in the footsteps of her predecessors... scarcely a single event is new. The wild insanity of the lady at Teignmouth has numerous prototypes… On the whole, independent of the want of novelty, we think the present work neither peculiarly interesting nor pleasing."
The Monthly Mirror was kinder: “one of the most promising efforts of the kind we have lately witnessed. The story appears to be founded upon real occurrences… the incidents are rapid and interesting… and the sentiments are uniformly creditable to the moral and religious principles of their author.”
The second Mrs. Mathews was admittedly a more successful author. The multi-volume Memoirs of Charles Mathews, which featured a lot of his correspondence and anecdotes from his life on the stage, was in print through the 19th century, a measure of the comic actor's enduring fame in England.
The Dictionary of National Biography mentions EKM in their entry for Charles Mathews as “the author of a volume of poems and some unsuccessful novels.”
| "To weep, Eliza, o'er a fate like thine" Eliza Kirkham Matthews' poetry is even worse than her prose. A collection of Eliza’s verse was published by subscription (ie crowdfunded) after her death, which helped raise funds for her husband Charles, then a struggling actor, to pay toward the family debts. The collection starts with a poem in her tribute, supposedly written by Charles, but it reads exactly like one of her poems. Some of her poems also appeared in poetry anthologies over the years. Her poetry is unrelievedly trite and tragic, mostly in the form of "in memoriam" tributes to lost loved ones and friends. The poems confirm that her novel What Has Been contains much autobiography. Like the heroine she created, Eliza lost her father, brother, mother, and sister in that order. Her brother George planned to go out to India, but died. Like her heroine Emily she walked on the cliffs at Teignmouth. EKM's poems express her utter despair and her struggles to attain Christian resignation, all expressed in terms of the "gushing tear" and her "rustic muse" and her "plaintive lyre." Charles Mathews gave a copy of the poems to a minister who attended on his dying wife. |  |
SONNET
 | When erst the flow’rs of genius ‘gan to bloom, A mournful wreath fair poetry enwove, To deck a sainted parent’s hallow’d tomb, The first, the dearest object of my love. With angel mien, and pity-beaming eye She twin’d the drooping flow’rets round my head, Pluck these she cried, they’ll lure the tender sigh, Whilst o’er poetic wilds you pensive tread. Pleas’d I attended while the fair nymph sung, My willing muse ne’er loiter’d at her strains, But touch’d her lyre, unloos’d my fetter’d tongue, And raptur’d hail’d her sister muses train: Ah! Check presumptuous maid thy daring flight! Nor hope to gain fame’s fascinating height! |
Attribution confusion
A gothic novel titled The Phantom, or Mysteries of the Castle was attributed to "the late Mrs. Mathews, of the Theatres Royal, York and Hull." “According to [antiquarian book expert] Burmester this represents a one volume reissue of a gothic novel first published in two volumes… in Hull in about 1798…” There are no known surviving copies of this first edition, so we don’t know what the original title page said. The 1825 (posthumous, if actually written by Eliza) edition adds “a new title page and preface" to the original printed pages from 1798.
EKM and Charles were in Hull after their marriage, so it’s possible she sold a novel, or had a novel printed. But I think it’s odd that this paint-by-numbers gothic novel contains no poetry. EKM interpolated her poems in all her other works of fiction, and poetry is commonly used in gothic novels, in the form of a song sung by the heroine as she's trapped in a tower or contemplating the scenery. The title page implies that "Mrs. Mathews" was an actress. His second wife was, but in 1825 she was alive in 1825. You could say she was "Mrs. Mathews, late of the Theatres Royal, etc." because she retired after her marriage. So I'm not certain which of the Mrs. Mathews wrote this novel, or whether either of them did.
What Has Been was republished in America after EKM's death (at that time, American publishers just stole novels and didn’t pay any copyright money).
A gothic novel titled The Phantom, or Mysteries of the Castle was attributed to "the late Mrs. Mathews, of the Theatres Royal, York and Hull." “According to [antiquarian book expert] Burmester this represents a one volume reissue of a gothic novel first published in two volumes… in Hull in about 1798…” There are no known surviving copies of this first edition, so we don’t know what the original title page said. The 1825 (posthumous, if actually written by Eliza) edition adds “a new title page and preface" to the original printed pages from 1798.
EKM and Charles were in Hull after their marriage, so it’s possible she sold a novel, or had a novel printed. But I think it’s odd that this paint-by-numbers gothic novel contains no poetry. EKM interpolated her poems in all her other works of fiction, and poetry is commonly used in gothic novels, in the form of a song sung by the heroine as she's trapped in a tower or contemplating the scenery. The title page implies that "Mrs. Mathews" was an actress. His second wife was, but in 1825 she was alive in 1825. You could say she was "Mrs. Mathews, late of the Theatres Royal, etc." because she retired after her marriage. So I'm not certain which of the Mrs. Mathews wrote this novel, or whether either of them did.
What Has Been was republished in America after EKM's death (at that time, American publishers just stole novels and didn’t pay any copyright money).
The Phantom Frontispiece "Let me beg of her, as yet, not to put her name to her novels"
EKM's brother-in-law William gave this advice to her, which was ignored. I guess the thinking was, don't attach your name to a novel "as yet" --until it's been published and is a success. He seems to have had some doubts on that score.
But Eliza liked publishing under her name and always included the 'Kirkham." Her mother was descended from a baronet, like the heroine in What Has Been.
Scholar Jan Fergus discovered that many anonymous titles erroneously attributed to Eliza Kirkham Mathews were actually written by Laetitia-Matilda Hawkins. Thus, the novels Constance, Arnold Zulig, Memoirs of a Scotch Heiress, and the collection of essays called The Pharos, (lighthouse) were not written by Mathews, despite what the internet tells you. (Fergus, Jan. "Laetitia Matilda Hawkins's Anonymous Novels Identified." Notes & Queries 54.2 (2007). Hawkins is the better writer, actually. Constance is reviewed here.
EKM is also sometimes confused with another authoress, Mrs. Charlotte Mathews, who wrote Simple Facts; or, The History of an Orphan (1793) and Perplexities; or, The Fortunate Elopement (1794).
EKM's brother-in-law William gave this advice to her, which was ignored. I guess the thinking was, don't attach your name to a novel "as yet" --until it's been published and is a success. He seems to have had some doubts on that score.
But Eliza liked publishing under her name and always included the 'Kirkham." Her mother was descended from a baronet, like the heroine in What Has Been.
Scholar Jan Fergus discovered that many anonymous titles erroneously attributed to Eliza Kirkham Mathews were actually written by Laetitia-Matilda Hawkins. Thus, the novels Constance, Arnold Zulig, Memoirs of a Scotch Heiress, and the collection of essays called The Pharos, (lighthouse) were not written by Mathews, despite what the internet tells you. (Fergus, Jan. "Laetitia Matilda Hawkins's Anonymous Novels Identified." Notes & Queries 54.2 (2007). Hawkins is the better writer, actually. Constance is reviewed here.
EKM is also sometimes confused with another authoress, Mrs. Charlotte Mathews, who wrote Simple Facts; or, The History of an Orphan (1793) and Perplexities; or, The Fortunate Elopement (1794).
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