Women's Travel Writings in India 1777–1854 Volumes 1-4 of 13

The memsahibs' of the British Raj in India are well-known figures today, frequently depicted in fiction, TV and film. In recent years, they have also become the focus of extensive scholarship. Less familiar to both academics and the general public, however, are the eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century precursors to the memsahibs of the Victorian and Edwardian era. Yet British women also visited and resided in India in this earlier period, witnessing first-hand the tumultuous, expansionist decades in which the East India Company established British control over the subcontinent. Some of these travellers produced highly regarded accounts of their experiences, thereby inaugurating a rich tradition of women's travel writing about India. In the process, they not only reported events and developments in the subcontinent, they also contributed to them, helping to shape opinion and policy on issues such as colonial rule, religion, and social reform. This new set in the Chawton House Library Women's Travel Writing series assembles seven of these accounts, six by British authors (Jemima Kindersley, Maria Graham, Eliza Fay, Ann Deane, Julia Maitland and Mary Sherwood) and one by an American (Harriet Newell). Their narratives - here reproduced for the first time in reset scholarly editions - were published between 1777 and 1854, and recount journeys undertaken in India, or periods of residence there, between the 1760s and the 1830s. Collectively they showcase the range of women's interests and activities in India, and also the variety of narrative forms, voices and personae available to them as travel writers. Some stand squarely in the tradition of Enlightenment ethnography; others show the growing influence of Evangelical beliefs. But all disrupt any lingering stereotypes about women's passivity, reticence and lack of public agency in this period, when colonial women were not yet as sequestered and debarred from cross-cultural contact as they would later be during the Raj. Their narratives are consequently a useful resource to students and researchers across multiple fields and disciplines, including women's writing, travel writing, colonial and postcolonial studies, the history of women's educational and missionary work, and Romantic-era and nineteenth-century literature. This volume includes 2 texts, Jemima Kindersley, Letters from the Island of Teneriffe, Brazil, the Cape of Good Hope, and the East Indies (1777) and Maria Graham, Journal of a Residence in India (1812) The ‘memsahibs’ of the British Raj in India are well-known figures today, frequently depicted in fiction, TV, and film. In recent years, they have also become the focus of extensive scholarship. Less familiar to both academics and the general public, how Cover 1 Volume1 2 Cover 2 Half Title 3 Title Page 5 Copyright Page 6 Table of Contents 7 Acknowledgements 9 General introduction 11 Volume I 33 Introduction to Volume I 33 A note on the texts 49 Jemima Kindersley, Letters from the Island of Teneriffe, Brazil, the Cape of Good Hope, and the East Indies (1777) 51 Maria Graham, Journal of a Residence in India (1812) 169 Textual variants 341 Volume2 347 Cover 347 Half Title 348 Title Page 350 Copyright Page 351 Table of Contents 352 Introduction 354 Harriet Newell, Memoirs of Mrs. Harriet Newell (1815) 370 Eliza Fay, Original Letters from India (1817) 500 Volume3 691 Cover 691 Half Title 692 Title Page 694 Copyright Page 695 Table of Contents 696 Introduction 698 Ann Deane, A Tour through the Upper Provinces of Hindostan (1823) 710 Julia Maitland, .Letters from Madras. (1846) 874 Textual variants 1014 Volume4 1016 Cover 1016 Half Title 1017 Title Page 1019 Copyright Page 1020 Table of Contents 1021 Introduction 1023 Mary Sherwood, The Life of Mrs Sherwood (1854) 1039 Island of Teneriffe,Cape of Good Hope,the East Indies,Textual variants This new collection assembles seven accounts of women who visited and resided in India between 1760 and 1840. The highly regarded accounts not only reported events and developments in the subcontinent, they also contributed to them, helping to shape opinion and policy on issues such as colonial rule, religion, and social reform. This new collection assembles seven accounts of women who visited and resided in India during 1760 and 1840. This first volume includes two texts, Jemima Kindersley, Letters from the Island of Teneriffe, Brazil, the Cape of Good Hope, and the East Indies (1777) and Maria Graham, Journal of a Residence in India (1812).