Lucy Aikin's Memoirs in the Court of Queen Elizabeth
Introduction
Lucy Aikin a well-known English author of the Romantic era, recognized for her historical memoirs and correspondence with other popular personalities of the 19th century, detailed in her biography. She hailed from the family of famous Dissenters, her father was John Aikin and her aunt Anna Letitia Barbauld, and both served as a source of inspiration for Aikin. She found her fame in 1818 when she published her first historical memoir on Queen Elizabeth I – Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth. Her work went into detail about all aspects of Queen Elizabeth’s life – her private affairs, family dynamics, “psychological conflicts, and the kinship networks that determined court policy” (Epistles, 19).
For this essay I chose to work on this memoir specifically because it was Aikin's first memoir and it had a profound impact on the writing style of memoirs at the time. Memoirs in the Court of Queen Elizabeth was an exmplary memoir in the 1800s because it of its wide reach and interest for the general public. The language used in the book is easily comprehensible and the content entails interesting details about Queen Elizabeth I's life, which makes it an engrossing read. Aikin chose not to focus on the religious and military aspect of the royal life, and her work generated a new genre of “court history” which was written with the help of the published sources at the time.What also caught my interest about this memoir was the way Aikin's feminist views were woven into the text as it “subtly called into question the sexist biases of earlier historical writing” (Epistles 20). Aikin's support of feminist ideology is reflected in this memoir about the Virgin queen of England.
I have looked at the 2 volumes of the memoir online, and Volume I which was published in 1818 appears to be Aikin's own copy gifted to Dr. Holland, who was Aikin's correspondant and friend. The very first page has the words "Dr. Holland. From the author", which proves it indeed is Aikin's own copy.
Publishing and Content
Her first court memoir was published in 1818 by London’s Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, a publishing company which was founded in 1724. Their publication timeline indicates that they published most works between 1814-1817, within which Aikin produced this memoir. The Women’s Print History Project contains around 279 works that have been published by this company, highlighting their influence in the world of publishing at the time, and they were one of the leading presses of the day. This shows the company's reach to the general public, which contributes to the memoir's popularity. It is mentioned that “their titles included the Edinburgh Review” and they also published William Wordsworth, S. T. Coleridge and Thomas Moore (Lucy Aikin's Historiography). Although Aikin had was “a widely published author” (Epistles, 18) at the time she wrote her first memoir, the popularity of the publishing company would have added to the success of her book. The memoir was printed by Richard and Arthur Taylor.
The first two pages in the digitization I used (archive.org) are blank except for the words “Dr. Holland; from the author” handwritten on top right corner. Dr. Holland was one of Aikin’s correspondents (Bodleian Archives and Manuscripts, Oxford).
Furthermore, Page 8 and page 9 are the title pages, and page 8 has a beautiful engraving of Queen Elizabeth with some writing underneath –
“In the dress in which she went to St. Pauls, for return thanks for the defeat of the Spanish Armada.”
“Engraved by Bond, from the extremely rare print by
Crispin de Palse, after a drawing by Isaac Oliver” (Memoir, 08)
Opening the book, the readers would get a portrait engraving that is considered “rare” (as mentioned on the engraved page), which is an enticing feature of the book, thus adding to its appeal to the public of the time. The preface of the book introduces the importance of history and literature, and roughly outlines the life of Queen Elizabeth and her “domestic history” (Epistles 12). It is kept short and to the point, only lasting 4 pages. The second volume continues right where the first one left off and does not contain the engraving of Queen Elizabeth which was in the first volume.
The memoir is "a view of the domestic history of her reign; memoirs of the principal families of the nobility and biographical anecdotes of the celebrated characters who composed her court; besides notices of the manners, opinions and literature of the reign." (Memoirs, Preface). It acknowledges Elzabeth as more than just a queen - by discussing her private life and affairs, Aikin appears to aim at making the sovereign's life captivating and worthy of attention separate from her political life.
Memoir's Success
Aikin’s memoirs have been “critically and commercially successful” (SFU Biography) and have been reprinted throughout England as well as America. These works have also been translated into other languages soon after first publishing, and have been followed by multiple editions, especially Memoirs in the Court of Queen Elizabeth. The memoirs were widely popular and “enthusiastically reviewed” by many publishers and critics at the time. The Eclectic Review mentioned that the memoir offered “more correct information” of Queen Elizabeth I’s time than any other existing biography or memoir, which not only shows the memoir’s critical popularity and how it was received by the readers, but also touches on its accuracy and Aikin’s eye for the “domestic history” of the period (SFU Lucy Aikin). Aikin’s memoirs further differ from others because of the way she structured her text around the “intimate views of private lives in various ages” (Epistles, 19) as we see in Queen Elizabeth I’s memoir which begins from the smallest details of her birth to her more important decisions as the queen. She also focuses on the “moral politics” instead of simply outlining Elizabeth’s political life. She also chose to give more focus to the influence of art, literature and culture of the time, giving “greater prominence than the earlier historians to the women of the court” (19). Aikin also mentions the important struggle between the Parliament and Monarchy of the time as well. Her writing is structured differently than other historians of her time as it focuses on the domestic aspect of the queen’s life instead of simply elaborating on her political life and decisions. The structure of the memoir is sequential and engrossing, which makes Aikin stand out and perhaps contributed to the popularity of Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth, as it was reprinted many times and contains two volumes and multiple additions. A year after its first edition, Queen Elizabeth’s memoir was already in its fourth edition, and by 1869 it had been reprinted eight times.
Another reason for the popularity of the memoir is her feminist writing and how most of the literature produced in the 1800s was supported by patriarchal ideologies and male supremacy. Greg Kucich, an expert on British Romanticism, describes the difference between Aikin’s feminist historiography and “men’s history”, where the latter tends to “filter out women’s experiences, values and achievements” (“Romanticism and Feminist Historiography,” 134). It is important to note that the significance of Aikin’s work goes beyond challenging misogynistic writing and promoting feminist history. Her memoirs depict the “combined attention to the large transformations of the public history … to reform both church and state – and to the small details of individual lives” (Epistles, 20).
While reading the first few chapters, I got insight into Queen Elizabeth's personal life (such as the death of her mother and its impact on the young ELizabeth, her complicated but close relationship with Jane Seymour, her relation to the commoners during her reign) (Memoirs Volume I, 28-44) which peaked my interest more and more as I went through the text, which is how I suppose the memoir was intended to be read. The reader gets to read about their queen's relations with her sister, the issues surrounding her marraige, the illnesses she suffered from, and much more (in Chapter VI of Volume I) . The memoir is filled with knowledgeable yet fascinating details that is bound to keep the reader engaged. I assume the history that is detailed in the memoir is highly dramatised to make it interesing and more compelling for the readers. The way the text is written - in a dramatic yet informative way - is certainly an addition to the success of the memoir, which can be seen by the many times it has been reprinted.
Global Assistance to the Memoir
Aikin’s friends across the globe also encouraged her memoirs and appreciated her work. Being an expert in “the art of conversation” (23) and appearing to be highly social, it can be assumed that her friends and connections might have assisted the widespread popularity of her book. For instance, her friend and famous American correspondent William Ellery Channing asked her to write “memoirs of the Commonwealth” (Correspondence, 219) instead of just the courts, which indicates her popularity across not only England but also America. The memoir was first published in America in 1821, followed by four more reprintings by 1870. It received “largely favourable views in the major periodicals of the day [which] signalled the importance of the memoirs” (Lucy Aikin's Historiography). Channing continued to support her by encourage her on her memoirs, and asks her on multiple occasions to write more of them. Their correspondence includes the mention of Charles I’s memoirs as well (Correspondance). Aikin reveals in these letters that she is asked to write memoirs of other royals, in addition to the ones she has already written about, which speaks volumes of its reception by the public (Correpondance, 219). She is known to have friends in India as well, such as Hindu Reformer Rajah Ram Mohan Roy, which further indicates her charming personality and zeal that can contribute to the global distribution of her works.
Aikin's first memoir impacted the genre of memoirs and pioneered the topic of court history. Her works have been raved about in the reviews, some calling her work one of the most influential in the field of historical memoirs, signifying its impact (Lucy Aikin's Historiography). Her work as a historian deserves the praise it has received as it is singular in the way it has been written - a dramatised court history written for readers to enjoy.
WORKS CITED
Aikin, Lucy. Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth. By Lucy Aikin. In Two Volumes. Third Edition. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, 1819.
Britannica, The Editors of Encyclopaedia. "William Ellery Channing". Encyclopedia Britannica, 28 Sep. 2021, https://www.britannica.com/biography/William-Ellery-Channing. Accessed 18 October 2021.
Brown, Susan, Patricia Clements, and Isobel Grundy, eds. Lucy Aikin entry: Writing screen within Orlando: Women's Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Online, 2006. <http://orlando.cambridge.org.proxy.lib.sfu.ca/>. 12 November 2021.
Levy, Michelle. “Lucy Aikin (1781-1864)”. SFU http://www.sfu.ca/~mnl/aikin/Site/Biography.html. Accessed 2021-10-18.
Levy, Michelle. "‘The Different Genius of Woman’: Lucy Aikin’s Historiography." Religious Dissent and the Aikin-Barbauld Circle, 1740–1860. Ed. Felicity James and Ian Inkster. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2011. 156-82. Print.
“Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown” http://worldcat.org/identities/lccn-nr93032708/. Accessed on November 10, 2021.
Kucich, Greg. "Romanticism and Feminist Historiography." The Wordsworth Circle 24.3 (1993): 133. ProQuest. Web. 11 Nov. 2021.
Oxford, Bodleian Libraries, MS. 16087/3.
"To Dr. Channing., Hampstead, May 29, 1834." Correspondence of William Ellery Channing, D.D. and Lucy Aikin, from 1826-1842. Ed. Anna Letitia Le Breton. London: Williams and Norgate, 1874. 227-33. British and Irish Women's Letters and Diaries Database. Web.
White, Daniel E. “The ‘Joinerina’: Anna Barbauld, the Aikin Family Circle, and the Dissenting Public Sphere.” Eighteenth-Century Studies, vol. 32, no. 4, [Johns Hopkins University Press, American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies (ASECS)], 1999, pp. 511–33, http://www.jstor.org/stable/30053931.