Bibliographical Essay [Rachel Sargent]
Paratextual Advertising in Sarah Burney’s 1812 edition of Traits of Nature
By Rachel Sargeant
Novel advertisements of the Romantic and Victorian era speak to how communal the culture of books and how shakily reputable the business of writing was during the early 1800s. Considering many authors, particularly female authors, chose to write under pseudonyms or anonymously, having a name associated with one’s work was already a reveal to the public of your status, and reputation controlled the social and financial success you had. With that in mind, the paratext of a novel can tell an audience more about the author’s situation than the cover or reviews ever could. Looking into the work of Sarah Harriet Burney (1772-1844), the first few pages of her work advertise an array of things about her and the market she was writing for. This paper looks at the paratextual advertising of Sarah Burney’s Traits of Nature including signatures, Advertisements, and the Preface, specifically the first volume of the 1812 second edition found in the Hathi Archives from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Burney began her publication journey by publishing Clarentine (1796) with G.G. and J. Robinson, a well-respected publisher that already circulated a high volume of women’s writing. However, Clarentine was first published anonymously, as many books written by women were at the time. Women from high status backgrounds were not expected to work, but rather “devote their efforts to making a good marriage” (Buzwell, 2020). To advertise your writing was to gain a larger audience and therefore more money, but also risk losing social standing. Burney and her brother struggled financially, and so keeping her name off of her work was a way to maintain her higher-class reputation while also generating income (Murley, 1998). She kept her anonymity when she published Geraldine Fauconberg with Robinson in 1808, and the publishers drew on the moderate success of her first novel by adding the tagline ‘By the Author of Clarentine’ printed below the title, a trait that is still seen in today’s publishing advertisements.
It is interesting to note that her first book under her new publisher, Henry Colburn, was the first time her name appeared on any of her works. Her 1812 novel Traits of Nature sold out within four months, and both newspaper advertisements of the period and new editions of her previous works all clearly include her name in their press (British Newspaper Archive, 2021). The signature that appears, “By Miss Burney, author of Clarentine, Geraldine Fauconberg, &c” (Haithi Trust Archive, 2021) tells of her growing fame and notoriety. Her other novels were well known and well-liked enough to claim them as hers; even if her name wasn’t recognized by a new reader, having a list of attributed publications gave her a sense of legitimacy and recognition.
Most Victorian novels were serialized due to high printing costs and lending library culture (Barrett, 2012), and Burney’s is no exception. The 1812 second edition of Traits of Nature was printed in four volumes instead of the usual three, and the story structure was tailored to this serialization. Traits ends on a cliffhanger, just before the introduction of the main character, Adela, to the antagonistic family, where it is implied major drama will occur. While leaving an audience wanting more is a smart tactic to make the reader buy the next volume, plainly telling the audience there will be four volumes advertises the book within itself. It declares the author is good enough to have sold multiple volumes, and builds reader anticipation by giving it a definitive ending.
A bolder form of advertising is to advertise yourself, and Burney puts her personality on display in her brazen Preface. According to Writing Masterclass 101, a workshop shared on the online educational platform MasterClass, a preface is “an introductory section of a book” before the main text that is “meant to draw readers in by offering information about the author’s experience writing the book, the inspiration behind the subject matter, the writing process, the purpose of the story, and historical context for the material” (MasterClass, 2021). Traits of Nature has an infamous preface in which Burney laments, “I can only say, in excuse for a very dull page which I am about to write: “My publisher asks me for a preface” (original emphasis, p. 9). Whereas a preface is selling the story of the novel’s inception, Burney’s preface is selling her personality. A reader gets a glimpse at her wit as she denounces the obligatory preface, saying it is “like a wig upon a judge” that is “imagined to confer dignity upon a book” (p.11). She states she’d rather the second edition be “in its original plainness” (p.11), indicating the first edition didn’t have one. Considering this book sold out its first printing, perhaps she thought this extra advertisement was unnecessary to boost sales, and the extra effort wasn’t worth her time. She ends the Preface with saying how she hopes she’s been “sufficiently ungracious” (p.11) as to not have to write another one, but who she is being ungracious to is questionable. Burney is snubbing both the reader’s expectations and the publisher’s requests, but this tactic of snark may have also been a selling point. The Preface comes across snobbish and rude, but it also comes across cheeky and comedic, setting up the reader’s expectations for the tone of Traits and possible future works.
Another way Burney builds on her marketable reputation is by advertising others. She opens the Preface with a reference to Mr. Edgeworth asking his daughter, fellow writer Maria Edgworth, for a preface and, while using this as a set up to mock her publisher, inadvertently advertises her own connections while promoting Edgeworth’s work. Much like modern publishing, where it is common to have a more well-known and reputable author write a sentence-long review to print on the cover - also known as a ‘blurb’ - to link the new book with an existing successful novel, we can see the same linkage of authors.
Speaking of linking author and reputation, Burney’s publisher makes very clear their lack of involvement in similar works. On the page after Traits of Nature’s Preface, a specifically labelled ‘Advertisement’ appears to work as a disclaimer. It reads:
“The Publisher of this Work thinks it proper
to state that MISS BURNEY is not the Author
of a Novel called “Seraphina,” published
the Year 1809, under the Name of CAROLINE BURNEY.”
(New York Library Archive, p.12)
Likely a pseudonym in itself, Caroline Burney was the supposed author of two 19th century novels, Seraphina (1809) and Lindamira (1810) (Wikimedia, 2021). Published by F. Hughes in the Star in June 1809 and in the Morning Chronicle of July 1809, Seraphina was advertised as “Miss Burney’s New Novel” (Wikimedia, 2021). Henry Colburn no doubt resented the false attribution for the market competition and loss of money from people buying Seraphina on assumption of it being the real Burney’s work. In this case, the Advertisement is being used as counter-promotion, further drawing attention to Sarah’s works and dismissing others’.
The paratextual advertising in the 1812 second edition of Traits of Nature shows a marketable book but an even more marketable author. The knowledge of upcoming volumes and the promotion of other works by the same author draws an audience in with the promise of future books and therefore, hope of future purchases. By being named, Sarah Burney is putting her reputation on the line to sell more novels, which appears to have worked, with how many more she published after Traits. By sassing her publisher about the Preface, Burney advertises her personality as more of a feminist, refusing to do the expected of her position as an author and equating it to her position as a woman. All these subtle types of promotion are the author and the publisher giving the reader a look into the woman behind the novel, which ultimately turned out to be beneficial for her writing career.
Works Cited:
Barrett, C. “Victorian Publishing History.” Great Writers Inspire, Jisc.co.uk, July 2012, https://writersinspire.org/content/victorian-publishing-history.
Burney, Sarah. “Traits of Nature, by Miss Burney ... V.1.” HathiTrust, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2021, https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uiuo.ark:/13960/t0zp49w5p&view=1up&seq=9&skin=2021.
Buzell, Greg. “Women Writers, Anonymity and Pseudonyms.” British Library, British Library, Oct. 2020, https://www.bl.uk/womens-rights/articles/women-authors-and-anonymity.
Griffin, Robert J. “Anonymity and Authorship.” New Literary History, vol. 30, no. 4, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1999, pp. 877–95, http://www.jstor.org/stable/20057576.
MasterClass. “Writing 101: How to Write a Preface for a Book - 2021.” MasterClass Articles, MasterClass, 26 Aug. 2021, https://www.masterclass.com/articles/how-to-write-a-preface-for-a-book.
Wikimedia. “Three-Volume Novel.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 20 Oct. 2021, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-volume_novel.
Wikimedia. “Caroline Burney.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 31 July 2021, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caroline_Burney
British Newspaper Archive Advertisements:
Artis Pocket Magazine. “Popular Novels, lately published by Henry Colburn, London.” City Herald, Saturday Dec. 20th 1817. Scanned article from https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0000990/18171220/023/0003
Stevenson, Matchett, & Stevenson. “This Day is Published: Popular Novels.” Norfolk Chronicle, December 27th 1817, Vol XLVIII No. 2194. Scanned article from
https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0000244/18171227/016/0001
The Statesman. “Books Published This Day”. The Statesman, Monday October 26th 1812. No. 2081. Scanned article from https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0002647/18121026/014/0001