Women's Theatrical Memoirs, Part I

Sharon M Setzer

Part I Volume 1 Mary Robinson, Memoirs of the Late Mrs Robinson (1801) In 1779, Robinson captured the heart of the young Prince of Wales as Perdita in The Winter's Tale. Her account is one of the highlights of her Memoirs, written almost twenty years later, amid the furore that erupted over William Godwin's publication of Memoirs of the Author of a Vindication of the Rights of Woman. The unfavorable reception of Godwin's intended tribute to Wollstonecraft provided Robinson with the impetus to rewrite the unsympathetic stories that followed her affair with the Prince of Wales. Volumes 2 & 3 James Boaden, The Life of Mrs Jordan (1831) Playwright and theatrical critic James Boaden's Life of Mrs Jordan promised its readers 'a more perfect picture' of the actress and 'a truer representation of her colourful "private life"' than any previous biographer had attempted. Both an admiring account of Dorothy Jordan's career on the stage and a sympathetic treatment of her life as mistress of Prince William Henry, Duke of Clarence (later William IV) and mother of his ten children, this remained the definitive biography of the actress for many years. Volumes 4 & 5 Thomas Campbell, Life of Mrs Siddons (1834) Thomas Campbell's biography offers an affectionate portrait of the most celebrated tragic actress of her generation. Based on correspondence, memoranda and personal recollections of the biographer's long-standing friendship with Siddons, Campbell's Life presents a compelling account of the actress's meteoric rise to fame following her appearance as Isabella in Thomas Southerne's Fatal Marriage at Drury Lane in 1782.