THE WOMEN NOVELISTS

BY
R. BRIMLEY JOHNSON
AUTHOR OF
“TALES PROM CHAUCER” “TOWARDS RELIGION”
“TENNYSON AND HIS POETRY”

LONDON: 48 PALL MALL
W. COLLINS SONS & CO. LTD.
GLASGOW MELBOURNE AUCKLAND

Copyright 1918

I have to thank the editor and publisher of The Athenæum for permission to reprint the chapter on “Parallel Passages”; the editor and publisher of The Gownsman for permission to use “A Study in Fine Art”; Professor Gollancz and Messrs. Chatto & Windus for permission to reprint the section on “Cranford” which was written for an Introduction to a reprint of that novel in “The King’s Classics.”

CONTENTS

PAGE
[Introduction][1]
[Before Miss Burney]
[The First Woman Novelist][7]
[Fanny Burney, 1752-1840]
[A Picture of Youth][35]
[Fanny Burney’s “Camilla”]
[“Cecilia” to “Sense and Sensibility”][54]
[Writers from 1782-1811]
[A Study in Fine Art][66]
[Jane Austen, 1775-1817]
[A “Most Accomplished Coquette”][105]
[Jane Austen’s “Lady Susan”]
[Parallel Passages][117]
[Jane Austen and Fanny Burney]
[“Persuasion” to “Jane Eyre”][131]
[Writers from 1818-1847]
[A Lonely Soul][164]
[Charlotte Brontë, 1816-1855]
[“Jane Eyre” to “Scenes of Clerical Life”][179]
[Writers from 1847-1858]
[A Professional Woman][204]
[George Eliot, 1819-1880]
[The Great Four][226]
[Burney, Austen, Brontë, George Eliot]
[The Woman’s Man][245]
[An Ideal and a Point of View]
[Personalities][263]
[Character Analysis and Biographical Outlines]
[Conclusion][282]
[Appendix—List of Minor Writers][293]
[Index to Authors and Titles][297]

THE WOMEN NOVELISTS