The Literary Gothic | Anna Barbauld

Barbauld, Anna Lætitia

20 June 1743 - 9 March 1825

English editor, poet, and writer of devotional works and children's literature as well as social and political criticism. Her involvement with the Gothic tradition is limited to a few theoretical discussions of some aesthetic and psychological aspects of literary practice, along with the attributed romance fragment "Sir Bertrand," intended to illustrate her theories.

Sites:

Anna Lætitia Barbauld Web Site

Devoted primarily to presenting hypertext editions of Barbauld's poems, this site also features a brief chronology and biographical note as well as various etexts. It includes the full text of , which features a memoir of Barbauld by her niece, the writer Lucy Aikin. [Lisa Vargo, U Saskatchewan]

Anna Letitia Barbauld Prose Works

A nice complement to Lisa Vargo's site, this one features not only etexts of Barbauld's prose but a bibliography and links. [Molly Beverstein and Laura Mandell, Miami U - Ohio]

Anna Barbauld

Includes biography, bibliography, and e-texts. [Celebration of Women Writers]

Biographical essay

[Mary Waters, U California, Davis; Literary Encyclopedia]

Barbauld, Anna Laetitia. The Works of Anna Laetitia Barbauld, with a Memoir by Lucy Aikin

[Etext Center, UVa]

Biographical note

Discusses Barbauld as a writer of "natural history" in the Romantic period. [Ashton Nichols, Dickinson College]

Brief biographical note

[Columbia Encyclopedia, Bartleby]

Brief biographical note a LitGothic etext

[John W. Cousins, A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature, 1910]

Chronology

Part of the hypertext edition of Barbauld's Poems from 1773. [Lisa Vargo and Allison Muri; Romantic Circles]

Bibliography

[Daniel White, U Toronto]

Portraits

[National Portrait Gallery, London]

click the cover image for more info from Amazon.com

Etexts:

"On the Pleasure Derived from Objects of Terror, with Sir Bertrand, A Fragment"

An important and influential 1773 essay on the psychology of terror, with an over-the-top "fragment" which is intended to illustrate the theory advanced in the essay itself. Although the entire work has traditionally been attributed to Barbauld, it is in fact the case that the "Sir Bertrand" fragment was written by her brother, John Aikin. [Michael Gamer, UPenn]
For another Romantic-era essay on supernaturalist theory and practice by a master of the literary Gothic tale, and one influenced by the Aikin/Barbauld piece, be sure to check out Ann Radcliffe's "On the Supernatural in Poetry;" see also John Wilson's "Some Remarks on the Use of the Preternatural in Works of Fiction" and Sir Walter Scott's "On the Supernatural in Fictitious Composition."

"On Romances"

[Michael Gamer, UPenn]