Gillian Dow, University of Southampton
Author Biography
Gillian Dow is Associate Professor in English at the University of Southampton, where she has a long association with the library at Chawton House, serving as Executive Director from 2014-2019. She has published articles and edited collections on Jane Austen, Anglo-French literary relations, and female networks in Europe. She is currently working on a book about women translators in France and Britain in the Romantic Period.
Abstract
The business of books, in the Romantic Period in Britain, was a pan-European affair. A new kind of publisher began marketing fiction on both sides of the Channel. The resulting competition to publish novels 鈥� and series of 鈥渃lassic鈥�, 鈥減opular鈥� and 鈥渕odern鈥� works for eager readers 鈥� involved multiple agents. In this article, I look at Sarah Harriet Burney鈥檚 relationships with London-based publishers and booksellers the Robinsons, Henry Colburn, Dulau and Thomas Tegg. I argue that she is an author whose career should be read in the context of work on women writers鈥� understanding of themselves as 鈥減rofessionals鈥�. In examining some intriguing passages from Sarah Harriet鈥檚 correspondence as well uncovering evidence provided by rare books, and publishers鈥� archival material, I reveal her talents as an accomplished networker, and as one who played a mediatory role for publishers on the make. Sarah Harriet is revealed, too, as an editor and translator of fiction, and as a writer who contributes to the extensive cross-Channel exchange in the post-Revolutionary and Napoleonic periods.
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