Bonhams 1793 : SEWARD (ANNA) Autograph letter signed, 1807

Autograph letter signed ("A. Seward"), to the Rev Robert Fellowes, editor of the Critical Review, reminding him that "on the 1st of this month I sent Mr. Crabbe's volume with an accompanying letter to you, by a Capt Bullstrode", which she hopes he has received; in a postscript, she seeks to forestall a possible misunderstanding following reports of the marriage of a cousin, also a Miss Seward of Lichfield, 2 pages, autograph address-leaf ("Revd Robt Fellowes, No 17 Featherstone Buildings, Gray's Inn, London"), note in an unidentified hand at the end: "Miss Seward's handwriting, given me by Mr. Fellowes, July 14, 1812", paper loss at corners where seal removed, 8vo, Lichfield, 10 November (postmarked 1807)

Estimate:

£400 - 600
€470 - 710
US$ 610 - 910

Footnotes

ANNA SEWARD AND GEORGE CRABBE'S STUDY OF MADNESS: the 'Swan of Lichfield' sends Crabbe's latest book of poems in for review. The volume to which she refers is Crabbe's Poems of 1807, his first appearance in print since the eighteenth century: although twelve years younger than her (she being born in 1742 and he in 1754), he must at this time have seemed to the public at large a relic of the age of Dr Johnson. For it had been Johnson who had helped launch his career; while Anna Seward's association with the great man had been even closer, if considerably more fraught. The principal new poem in Crabbe's volume was 'Sir Eustace Grey', a daring work portraying the hallucinations of a patient in a madhouse. The volume was published by Hatchard's that October; and launched Crabbe's second career that made him one of the best-selling poets of the day.

The letter's recipient, Robert Fellowes advocate of Jewish emancipation and promoter of London University served as editor of The Critical Review between 1804 and 1811. His paper had generally been a warm supporter of Crabbe, but does not appear to have reviewed this particular volume (see Crabbe: the Critical Heritage, edited by Arthur Pollard, 1972, and Réné Huchon, George Crabbe and his Times, 1907). Nor does this letter appear in The Letters of Anna Seward: Written Between the Years 1784 and 1807 (1811). The Critical Review did however go on to welcome Crabbe's subsequent productions; so one can only speculate that the volume Anna Seward sent Robert Fellowes miscarried.

Category: Books / Books, Maps and Manuscripts

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