Lady Morgan’s Memoirs
Thomas Dermody to Sydney Owenson, 14 September 1801
My volume is already in the press, and I hope will soon be published,
for I abhor correcting proofs. Let me inform you how far you are connected with
it. The sonnet to you is to be published with a note, and another long, and
perhaps not despicable poem, called “An Epistle to a Young Lady after many years
Absence.” I did not think it might be agreeable or prudent to
affix your name. I will also confess that in writing the verses to Anthenæ
(a Greek name of my own, signifying flowery, and in a figurative sense
amiable,) you were not entirely absent from my imagination. Between friends,
this is my chef-d’œuvre,
and I have no small hopes of its future success, with a little patience. I feel
a sensible and refined delight in ![]()
| 218 | LADY MORGAN'S MEMOIR. | |
![]()
paying this tribute of
the purest affection to an object so worthy of every emotion, and mostly on
that account I should be elevated with the applause that must consequently be
shared. I had the honour of a letter from Mr.
Addington (the Prime Minister) on receiving a copy of my
ode—he has behaved well and promises much. You see I am a little favoured
by the great as well as by the fair. You are mistaken if you imagine I have not
the highest respect for your friend Moore. I have written the review of his poems in a strain of
panegyric to which I am not frequently accustomed. I am told he is a most
worthy young man, and I am certain myself of his genius and erudition. Did you
not laugh at and think some of my letters extremely romantic? They were so, I
allow, but on my soul it is impossible to write to my dear sister without being
so. I would willingly not increase the crowd of idle flatterers that surround a
young woman of sense, and accomplishments and beauty; however, I should not be
displeased that you could conceive how much I value you. I often converse with
you in fancy, and feel my heart lighter and better after this imaginary
tête-à-tête. I
am not often in the company of females, and when I am, I turn with disgust from
their odious affectation and insensibility, to the “celestial
visitant” which my own rapturous melancholy forms. I certainly esteem, I
may almost say love, you more than I actually should in your presence. Absence
so softens and breathes such a delicious languor over the truly tender heart! I
remember a tune (excuse me, lady,) when I thought you affected, ![]()
![]()
haughty and unkind! Do I think you so now? No! I
undoubtedly place your single approbation above all the vain trophies which
mortals hoard, “by wit, by valour, or by wisdom won!” and your
unimpassioned and delicate attachment with “glorious fumes intoxicates my
mind.” But how is our father? I need not inquire, you would have told me
had there been any material occurrence. Happy evenings! I cannot but remember
such things were most dear to me. Miss Livy (what an historical abbreviation!)
and Miss Sydney too (how heroic!) might have
spared their laughter,—beneath the dignity of a Laura or a Stella. You had
no determinate description of the sylph to animate your pencil; try this
subject at your leisure, though I fear it is too wild and horrible. My Car of
Death is finely dreadful, but my only copy is with the printer. It is in the
“.”
Conceive how I idolise your remembrance. Were you
Venus I should forget you; but you are
a Laura, a Leonora, an Eloisa, all in
one delightful assemblage! My idea of your literary merit is very exalted
indeed; this in a woman, a beautiful woman, whom I must ever esteem, what magic
can be so irresistible in this world!
Pray did you not mistake my meaning in some passage where
you say I seem to boast of an affected libertinism? certainly, my fair
monitress, you did.
I have been a libertine but never a hypocrite, for which
reason my failings have been more noted than my few deserts. I detest and
despise the false taste and false wit of modern infidelity. I have written ![]()
| 220 | LADY MORGAN'S MEMOIR. | |
![]()
some very pretty lines to a “Brown Beauty;” you will see them
in my volume. There are two imitations of Spenser which I am sure you will like; besides the , which is
entirely in obsolete English, and on which rests my reputation. But, perhaps,
you would rather have some of “my dear prose” than my d—d
poetry!
When the publication of this volume is complete, I am
determined to have one month’s happiness in Ireland; but it must be when
you are at home. What a meeting it will be, if I do not deceive myself! Then I
may share (another quotation of mine from the epistle to you by name):—
“the exalted power Of social converse o’er the social hour.” |
![]()
How I long for you to read my next volume; you make so
sweet a part of it yourself. It is my pride to be publicly allied to you in
fame as I am privately in the fondest friendship. Adieu.
September 14th, 1801.
Lady Olivia Clarke [née Owenson] (1785 c.-1845)
The younger sister of Lady Morgan who married Dublin physician Sir Arthur Clarke
(1778-1857) in 1808. She wrote songs and a play, and published in the
Metropolitan Magazine and
Athenaeum.
Thomas Dermody (1775-1802)
Prolific Irish poet whose early promise a child prodigy went unfulfilled; after the
publication of James Grant Raymond's 1806 biography he became a type of the wastrel
bard.
Thomas Moore (1779-1852)
Irish poet and biographer, author of the
Irish Melodies (1807-34),
The Fudge Family in Paris (1818), and
Lalla
Rookh (1817); he was Byron's close friend and designated biographer.
Edmund Spenser (1552 c.-1599)
English poet, author of
The Shepheards Calender (1579) and
The Faerie Queene (1590, 1596).
