I TOO AM HERE: Selections from the Letters of Jane Welsh Carlyle

by Alan & Mary McQueen Simpson--Eds. Simpson ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 1, 1977

A book for enjoyment--for bedside, weekend, and vacation,"" Vassar president Alan Simpson and his wife Mary call their selection of the letters of Mrs. Thomas Carlyle, the elfin wife of the 19th-century man of letters. The correspondence has been worked over, and selections published, many times before. After a century of controversy, the Simpsons aim at a calm view of the question of whether--bluntly--Carlyle's dyspeptic domination destroyed the abilities of a might-have-been woman of letters. But they weasel a bit, and waffle, and don't quite answer their question. Their introduction, and the headings of their separate sections--""Courtship,"" ""Portrait of Carlyle,"" ""Upstairs and Downstairs,"" ""Illness""--take an indefinite position. Mrs. Carlyle had a way with a pen, and no children, but not quite the determination--in spite of her husband's occasional sincere encouragement--to set to on a book of her own. So we have the letters, and also the controversy--touched off when her husband's disciple, James Anthony Froude, declared her underrated, and fanned into flame by Virginia Woolf's splendid little TLS piece, ""Geraldine and Jane,"" in which Jane and her Manchester friend Geraldine Jewsbury, a miniscule novelist, reflect on whether or not the stories of their lives may encourage women as yet unborn. Jane's letters are often delightful if frequently long-winded, especially on such out-of-date topics as house-cleaning and how to deal with underpaid maids. Still, Leigh Hunt immortalized, her--""Jenny kissed me when we met""--and her husband admired her writings prodigiously, as do Alan and Mary Simpson.

Pub Date: April 1, 1977

ISBN: 0521134986

Page Count: -

Publisher: Cambridge Univ. Press

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1977

Categories: NONFICTION