Elizabeth Barrett to Mary Russell Mitford, 21 November 1842:
'Keep my secret -- but I have been reading a good deal lately of the new French literature [...]
I was curious beyond the patience of my Eve-ship, & besides grew so interested in France &
the French through my long apprentice ship to the old Memoirs that I felt pricked to the heart
to know all about the posterity of my heroes & heroines. And besides I live out of the world
altogether, & am lonely enough & old enough & sad enough & experienced enough in every
sort of good & bad reading, not to be hurt personally by a French superfluity of bad [...]
[George Sand] is eloquent as a fallen angel [...] Then there is Eugene Sue, & Frederic Soulie,
& De Queile .. why the whole literature looks like a conflagration -- & my whole being aches
with the sight of it [...] Full indeed of power & caprice & extravagance is this new French
literature [...] The want is, of fixed principle [...] Now tell me, what you think? That it is very
naughty of me to read naughty books -- or that you have done the same?'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Elizabeth Barrett Print: Book
Elizabeth Barrett to Mary Russell Mitford, 27 November 1842:
'I have just done reading a romance of Frederick Soulie's which begins with a violation & a
murder, & ends consistently with a murder & a violation, -- the hero who is the agent of this
"just proportion" being shut up at last & starved in a premature coffin, after having his eyelids
neatly sowed [sic] up by the fair fingers of his lady-love.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Elizabeth Barrett Print: Book
Elizabeth Barrett to Mary Russell Mitford, 24 December 1844:
'[Frederic Soulie] was one of the first of the new French school I ventured to approach, & he made me open my eyes very wide indeed.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Elizabeth Barrett Print: Book
Elizabeth Barrett to Mary Russell Mitford, 30 December 1844:
'With regard to "La Confession Generale," I am in just your case, -- having read only the first
volume, & failed of the others [i.e. not been able to obtain them from library], -- there are
three: & I was the more provoked because I was interested in the denouement [...] Do you
know "Fernande" by Dumas? It was sent to me instead of "Un homme serieux", last night __ &
I rather like the opening. But Dumas is a second-class writer.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Elizabeth Barrett Print: Book
Elizabeth Barrett Browning to Mary Russell Mitford, 8 February 1847:
'The "Siecle" has for a feuilleton a new romance of Soulie's called "Saturnin Fichet," which is
really not good .. & tiresome to boot. Robert & I began by each of us reading it, but after a
little while he left me alone being certain that no good could come of such a work: so, of
course, ever since, I have been exclaiming & exclaiming as to the wonderful improvement &
increasing beauty & glory of it, .. just to justify myself, & to make him sorry for not having
persevered! The truth is, however, that but for obstinacy, I should give up too. Deplorably
dull, the story is, .. & there is a crowd of people each more indifferent than each'.
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Elizabeth Barrett Browning Print: Newspaper
Elizabeth Barrett Browning to Mary Russell Mitford, 8 February 1847:
'The "Siecle" has for a feuilleton a new romance of Soulie's called "Saturnin Fichet," which is
really not good .. & tiresome to boot. Robert & I began by each of us reading it, but after a
little while he left me alone being certain that no good could come of such a work: so, of
course, ever since, I have been exclaiming & exclaiming as to the wonderful improvement &
increasing beauty & glory of it, .. just to justify myself, & to make him sorry for not having
persevered! The truth is, however, that but for obstinacy, I should give up too. Deplorably
dull, the story is, .. & there is a crowd of people each more indifferent than each'.
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Robert and Elizabeth Barrett Browning Print: Newspaper
Mary Russell Mitford to Elizabeth Barrett Browning, letter postmarked 2 October 1847:
'The most interesting [book] that I have read for many years is Lamartine's Histoire des
Girondins [...] Also I am reading Appert's Dix Ans a la Cour de Louis Philippe, very pleasant
esprit -- & have just finished Le Chien d'Alcibiade -- a Tale of some cleverness although too
close an imitation of Gerfaut [...] I see by the papers that poor Frederic Soulie is dead -- I
was just reading a novel of his on the wars of La Vendee (Saturnine Fichet [sic]) which was
interesting -- only he had imitated a likeness between two persons from the old French Story
of Martin Guerre, which story aforesaid [...] Dumas had been using in Les Deux Diane -- by
the way I am reading 3 series by Dumas, Les Deux Diane -- Les Memoires d'un Medecin & Le
Batard de Mouleon [...] Of English books I have been much pleased by Mr Jesse[']s Antiquities
of London -- very pleasant gossip -- & St John[']s Wild sports of the Highlands a mixed Vol of
Deerstalking & Natural History which is charming'.
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Mary Russell Mitford Print: Unknown
Elizabeth Barrett to Mary Russell Mitford, 4 February 1845:
'Do you think you cd. take courage & attempt the eight volumes of Frederic Soulie[']s Memoires du diable? eight rather thick volumes? I am in the midst & heat of them -- & though they stink in one's nostrils not infrequently & are full of the most gorgeous extravagances, the variety & power, the invention, (flash upon flash), & the vividness of life all through, render them to my mind, a most remarkable work [...] Much in it is most disgusting. But you [italics]must[end italics] be struck by the variety of power in it, -- & I cant keep back any new sight from you. Yes indeed! -- how nearer & nearer we are drawn in this "palpitating literature," as you call it so truly! palpitating is just the word! & it sets me palpitating too, whatever it may do by yourself'.
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Elizabeth Barrett Print: Book
Elizabeth Barrett to Mary Russell Mitford, 26 February 1845:
'Tell me, was Soulie's "Confession Generale" never finished? Did it stop short for ever at the second volume with you as with me? Because it is interesting -- and I am suspended in the air in the case of an interesting book that wont end: it[']s a cruel punishment which Dante should have put into Hell, instead of this side the gate of it .. "that day they read no more." Perhaps he meant to hint it so -- & that the thought of the unfinished book tormented the damned lovers as one of the forms of their damnation.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Elizabeth Barrett Print: Book
Elizabeth Barrett to Mary Russell Mitford, 5 April 1845:
'A most singular book of Eugene Sue's [sic] I have read lately, the whole front of which is directed against slave-emancipation & the part which England has played in it [...] The scene is laid in a sugar plantation in the West Indies, & the book, from its very imbecility, is worth your looking into -- Very weak it is, to be sure, -- & outrageously absurd -- and you will see at once that a philanthropist & liberal who advocates the slave-trade, can scarcely be [italics]thorough[end italics] & consistently cordial in free opinions.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Elizabeth Barrett Print: Book
'From the toshie Soulie I have unearthed another flawed jewel of energy and drunken Genius: - La Lionne ...'
Century: 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: Robert Louis Stevenson Print: Book
'From the toshie Soulie I have unearthed another flawed jewel of energy and drunken Genius: - La Lionne, followed by La Comtesse de Monrion.'
Century: 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: Robert Louis Stevenson Print: Book
'From the toshie Soulie I have unearthed another flawed jewel of energy and drunken Genius: - La Lionne, followed by La Comtesse de Monrion... I have also read a play by him: Le Fils de la Folle.'
Century: 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: Robert Louis Stevenson Print: Book
