Fall 2008 - The Johns Hopkins University Press

Anna Letitia BarbauldVoice of the EnlightenmentWilliam McCarthyAgainst the background of the American and French Revolutions, theNapoleonic Wars, and the struggle for religious equality in Great Britain,a brilliant, embattled woman strove to defend Enlightenment values to hernation. Poet, teacher, essayist, political writer, editor, and critic, Anna LetitiaBarbauld was venerated by contemporaries on both sides of the Atlantic,among them the young Walter Scott, the young Samuel Taylor Coleridge, andBoston Unitarians such as William Ellery Channing. After decades in the historicallimbo into which almost all work by women writers of her era wasswept, Barbauld’s writing on citizenly ethics, identity politics, church-staterelations, and empire are still relevant today. Inquiring and witty as well asprincipled and passionate, Barbauld was a voice for the Enlightenment in anage of revolution and reaction.Based on more than fifteen years’ research in dozens of librariesand archives in five countries, this is the first full-lengthbiography of one of the foremost women writers inGeorgian England.William MccARTHY is professor emeritus of English atIowa State University and author of Hester Thrale Piozzi:Portrait of a Literary Woman.December 848 pages 6 x 9¼64 halftones978-0-8018-9016-1 0-8018-9016-0$60.00(s) / £32.00 hcBiography / LiteratureCameo image courtesy of Paula FeldmanTHE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY PRESS 1-800-537-5487 25