'"In reading Lady Mary W Montagu's letters, whi[ch] we have had lately, I continually felt a want - I had not the least affection for her" D[orothy] W[ordsworth] to Lady Beaumont, 11 April 1805).'
Unknown
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Dorothy Wordsworth
Henry James to Thomas Sergeant Perry, from home of host family in Bonn, Sunday 5 August 1860: "[on Wednesday morning] I sat down to read [in the study] till our room should be made ready for me to go in and set to work. I looked over an old volume of the 'British Chronicle,' a lot of bound weekly newspapers of the time of Byron, Shelley, Tom Moore and Walter Scott and which I had discovered in a corner the night before. Then I finished the Letters of Lady M. W. Montague which I had commenced a few days before from curiosity and had continued from interest."
Century: 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: Henry James Print: Book
Elizabeth Barrrett to Lady Margaret Cocks, 29 September 1837:
'I confess to you that I utterly dislike Lady Mary! [...] She had a hard shining imagination,
instead of a heart -- and words studied into carelessness, beating up & down, where warm
natural woman pulses ought to have beat. She had too little depth for manhood, -- & too little
softness for womanhood. Take away the corner stone & the top stone from Horace Walpole's
imagination -- or rather, take away what poetry he had -- & dress him up in a hoop -- & there
is Lady Mary Wortley Montague ready for court!! ---- I never could bear her -- or Horace
Walpole either -- and whenever I have looked at her letters, I have felt too much out of
humour to be amused.'
'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Elizabeth Barrett Print: Book
[Catherine Talbot to Elizabeth Carter, 14 May 1763:]
'Some of [Carlo Maggi's] prose is delightful. Pray do not read the death of Adam. It is
extremely fine, but so painful, that at first it gives one's thoughts a wrong turn -- one cannot get it out of one's head; yet if one thinks it thoroughly over, one may get a great deal of good out of it. We shall have a very different one after supper, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu's Letters. They are very amusing for that half hour, and I dare say genuine. Mrs Montagu whom I saw a few days ago, first told me of them.'
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Catherine Talbot and family Print: Book
