British Literary Salons of the Late Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries (Nineteenth-Century Major Lives and Letters)

British salons, with guests such as Byron, Moore, and Thackeray, were veritable hothouses of political and cultural agitation. Using a number of sources - diaries, letters, silver-fork novels, satires, travel writing, Keepsakes, and imaginary conversations - Schmid paints a vivid picture of the British salon between the 1780s and the 1840s. "British literary salons of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries is a comprehensive study of the British salon between the 1780s and the 1840s. It traces the activities of three salonnières, Mary Berry, Lady Holland, and the Countess of Blessington, maps out the central place these circles held in London, and explains to what extent they shaped intellectual debate and publishing ventures. Authors like Byron, Moore, Thackeray, and Baillie emerge as regular guests. Using a large number of sources--diaries, letters, silver-fork novels, satires, travel writing, Keepsakes, and imaginary conversations--this study establishes sociable networks of days gone by"-- Provided by publisher British salons, with guests such as Byron, Moore, Thackeray, and Baillie, were veritable hothouses of political and cultural agitation. In this comprehensive study of the British salon between the 1780s and the 1840s, Schmid traces the activities of three salonnïres: Mary Berry, Lady Holland, and the Countess of Blessington. Mapping out the central place these circles held in London, this study explains to what extent they shaped intellectual debate and publishing ventures. Using a large number of sources -- diaries, letters, silver-fork novels, satires, travel writing, "Keepsakes", and imaginary conversations-- the book establishes sociable networks of days gone by Front Matter....Pages i-xi Traditions and Theories....Pages 1-21 Mary Berry and her British Spaces....Pages 23-49 Mary Berry as a Learned Woman: Out of the Closet....Pages 51-69 Holland House and Lady Holland....Pages 71-95 The Holland House Set....Pages 97-117 The Countess of Blessington as Hostess....Pages 119-143 The Countess of Blessington as Writer and Editor....Pages 145-171 Epilogue....Pages 173-175 Back Matter....Pages 177-252