Frances Burney's camilla: To print my grand work ... by subscription

Eighteenth-Century Studies

Volumn 40, Issue 1, 2006, Pages 51-68

  Pink, Emma E ^a  

^a SIMON FRASER UNIVERSITY   (Canada)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 60949583846     PISSN: 00132586     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1353/ecs.2006.0046     Document Type: Review

References (36)

1. Works published during Burney's lifetime include Evelina: or, a Young Lady's Entrance into the World (1778)
2. Cecilia, or Memoirs of an Heiress (1782)
3. Brief Reflections Relative to the Emigrant French Clergy (1793)
4. Camilla, or, a Picture of Youth (1796)
5. The Wanderer; or, Female Difficulties (1814)
6. and Memoirs of Charles Burney (1832)
7. In The Field of Cultural Production, ed. and introduced by Randal Johnson (New York: Columbia Univ. Press, 1993)
8. Margaret Anne Doody, Frances Burney: The Life in the Works (New Brunswick: Rutgers Univ. Press, 1988)
9. Janice Farrar Thaddeus, Frances Burney: A Literary Life (London: MacMillan, 2000)
10. Peter Sabor, ed. and introduction, The Subscription List to Frances Burney's Camilla, by Frances Burney (Montreal: Burney Centre and Burney Society, 2003)
11. For the purposes of this essay I am using George Justice's definition of "literary marketplace" as delineated in The Manufacturers of Literature: Writing and the Literary Marketplace in Eighteenth-Century England (Newark: Univ. of Delaware Press, 2002), 16: "I employ the term 'literary marketplace' ... to describe both the physical locations for printing, selling, and reading printed matter and, in the sense that the phrase is used today, to describe a system of procedures through which human agents understand the transactions and customs regulating the publication of what is known as 'intellectual property.' ... It is my contention that the relationship between the material and ideological aspects of the literary marketplace defines Literature as a cultural category and shapes the various individual elements of works, authors, publishers, and readers."
12. For a discussion of Burney's strategies of self-fashioning as employed in her early career, see Betty A. Schellenberg's "From Propensity to Profession: Female Authorship and the Early Career of Frances Burney," Eighteenth-Century Fiction 14.3-4 (April-July 2002): 345-70
13. Thus, much like Schellenberg, I recognize both Burney's earlier and later periods of authorship "as equally formative in her professionalization" (Schellenberg, "From Propensity to Profession," 348)
14. I am using the term "publisher" in the broad functional sense suggested by the OED ("One who as author, or esp. as editor, gives [a book or literary work] to the public; 'one who puts out a book into the world'"; "one who undertakes the printing or production of copies of such works, and their distribution to the booksellers and other dealers, or to the public"), to argue that Burney was intimately involved in the processes associated with bringing her third novel to the public, and in being so, fulfilled many of the responsibilities of publisher and agent. For an example of the production details Burney attended to in publishing Camilla, see her letter to her brother Charles (17 June 1796) (JL, 3:168-70)
15. Randal Johnson, Introduction, The Field of Cultural Production, by Pierre Bourdieu, 6
16. James Raven, Introduction, The English Novel 1770-1829: A Bibliographical Survey of Prose Fiction Published in the British Isles, by James Raven and Antonia Forster, vol. 1, ed. Peter Garside, James Raven, and Rainer Schöwerling (Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 2000), 30-1
17. Susan Kubica Howard, Introduction, Evelina: or, a Young Lady's Entrance into the World, by Frances Burney (Peterborough, Ontario: Broadview, 2000), 12. When arranging to publish Evelina anonymously, Burney negotiated with the book's publisher, Thomas Lowndes of Fleet Street, through unsigned letters written in a disguised hand
18. Frances Burney, Evelina: or, a Young Lady's Entrance into the World, ed. Edward A. Bloom, introduction and notes by Vivien Jones (Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 2002), 9. All subsequent references to Evelina will be to this edition and will be cited parenthetically
19. Frances Burney, The Early Journals and Letters of Fanny Burney, ed. Lars E. Troide and Stewart J. Cooke, 4 vols. (Montreal & Kingston and London: McGill-Queen's Univ. Press, 1994), 3:47n. According to Troide and Cooke, Charles Burney conveyed his request in a letter (5-6 July 1778) written to Burney by her sister, Susanna
20. Catherine Gallagher, Nobody's Story: The Vanishing Acts of Women Writers in the Marketplace, 1670-1820 (Berkeley and Los Angeles: Univ. California Press, 1994), 216
21. According to Cheryl Turner, "The bulk of popular novels, including those by women, were probably sold to the publishers for around the five guineas received by Phebe Gibbs from T. Lowndes on 14 April 1763 'for the novel called "The Life of Mr. Francis Clive."'" Cheryl Turner, Living By the Pen: Women Writers in the Eighteenth Century (London and New York: Routledge, 1992), 114
22. Frances Burney, The Journals and Letters of Fanny Burney (Madame D'Arblay), ed. Joyce Hemlow, 10 vols. (Oxford: Clarendon, 1972- ), 3:124-5
23. Justine Crump, ed. and introduction, A Known Scribbler: Frances Burney on Literary Life, by Frances Burney (Toronto: Broadview, 2002), 279n
24. F. J. G. Robinson and P. J. Wallis, Book Subscription Lists: A Revised Guide (Newcastle upon Tyne: Harold Hill & Son [The Book Subscriptions List Project], 1975), iii
25. Thomas Lockwood, "Subscription-Hunters and Their Prey," Studies in the Literary Imagination 34.1 (Spring 2001): 121-35, 123
26. According to Sabor, the thousand pounds paid for the copyright of Camilla "was certainly impressive, eclipsing the previous record for a novel of five hundred pounds that Ann Radcliffe had made for the copyright of The Mysteries of Udolpho in 1794
27. and also exceeding the eight hundred pounds that Radcliffe would earn for The Italian in 1797" (11-2)
28. Joyce Hemlow's "Editorial Policy" in volume one of Journals and Letters notes that angle brackets indicate "Uncertain readings" (JL, 1:lviii)
29. Dustin Griffin, Literary Patronage in England, 1650-1800 (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1996), 15
30. Betty A. Schellenberg, The Professionalization of Women Writers in Eighteenth-Century Britain (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 2005), 111
31. In order to ensure royal approval, Burney planned to advertise Camilla as "A New Work" (rather than a novel) in the subscription proposals, for as she explained to her father (18 June 1795), "I remember the Word Novel was long in the way of Cecilia, as I was told, at the Queen's House. And it was not permitted to be read by the Princesses, till it was sanctioned by a Bishop's recommendation" (JL, 3:117)
32. Thus, the novel was initially advertised as "a NEW WORK" (7 July 1795) (JL, 3:122)
33. According to Joyce Hemlow, Burney's "eventual acquiescence is reflected in the advertisements in the newspapers when the original caption 'a NEW WORK ... by the author of Evelina & Cecilia' (see, e.g., The Times, 20 July, 5 Aug. 1795) was changed in 1796 to 'a NEW NOVEL'" (JL, 3:117n). Thus, Burney, although aware of existing anxieties regarding the novel form, demonstrates her willingness to accede to the advice of others, once again revealing her ability to negotiate the network of interests (public and private, material and aesthetic) operating in the cultural field and employ them to benefit her writing life
34. Edward A. Bloom and Lillian D. Bloom, introduction and explanatory notes, Camilla: Or, A Picture Of Youth, by Frances Burney, ed. Edward A. Bloom and Lillian D. Bloom (Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 1972, 1983), 928
35. Hester Davenport, Faithful Handmaid: Fanny Burney at the Court of King George III (Stroud: Sutton, 2000), 172
36. Griffin, in his treatment of Charlotte Lennox, suggests the various forms of patronage operating during this period and the possibility of advantages accruing to members of the writer's family. For example, Griffin tells us that in the 1750s the Duke of Newcastle offered to secure Lennox a royal pension. However, "Lennox is said to have 'very politely declined ... in favour of her husband, for whom she solicited a place, which the Duke promised to procure him the first opportunity'" (206-7). Commenting on Lennox's handling of this situation, Schellenberg suggests the complex of cultural, political, and economic interests being negotiated, noting that "Lennox's choice rather to request a post for her husband was based on the gamble that, because a pension might well end with the aged king George II's death, such a position would provide more permanent support. The fact that this place, obtained through the Duke of Newcastle, proved an impediment to later patronage with the eclipse of the duke's influence, while tying Lennox to the wellbeing of a husband with whom her relationship appears to have been increasingly strained, does not change the fact that a pension likely signified an annual income of £200 to £300 in recognition of her achievements, and a highly unusual form of recognition for a female writer" (Schellenberg, Professionalization of Women Writers, 105)