I now sit down on my botom to answer all the kind & beloved letters...
March 21, 2022 2:11 PM Subscribe
Marjory Fleming died in 1811 from complications of measles. She was not quite nine years old. Yet, over fifty years later, the little Scottish girl became a famous author. She was celebrated for the naughtiness and sharp observations in her diaries, published here, which read a bit like an Eloise of Regency Scotland.
In the love novels all the heroins are very desperate Isabella will not allow me to speak about lovers & heroins and tiss too refined for my taste ... A sailor called here to say farewell, it must be dreadful to leave his native country where he might get a wife or perhaps me, for I love him very much & with all my heart, but O I forgot Isabella forbid me to speak about love
... I am now going to tell you about the horible and wretched plaege that my multiplication gives me you cant concieve it — the most Devilish thing is 8 times 8 & 7 times 7 it is what nature itselfe cant endure
She gained the praise of authors as prominent as Robert Louis Stevenson and Mark Twain, who said she was "made of thunderstorms and sunshine." Some Victorian writers made a bit too much of her; one invented her sentimental friendship with Sir Walter Scott out of thin cloth. As the fad for everything Scottish faded, so did public interest in Marjory. But an excerpt from her diaries is the first in Revelations: Diaries of Women, a 1974 anthology with a fascinating range.
In the love novels all the heroins are very desperate Isabella will not allow me to speak about lovers & heroins and tiss too refined for my taste ... A sailor called here to say farewell, it must be dreadful to leave his native country where he might get a wife or perhaps me, for I love him very much & with all my heart, but O I forgot Isabella forbid me to speak about love
... I am now going to tell you about the horible and wretched plaege that my multiplication gives me you cant concieve it — the most Devilish thing is 8 times 8 & 7 times 7 it is what nature itselfe cant endure
She gained the praise of authors as prominent as Robert Louis Stevenson and Mark Twain, who said she was "made of thunderstorms and sunshine." Some Victorian writers made a bit too much of her; one invented her sentimental friendship with Sir Walter Scott out of thin cloth. As the fad for everything Scottish faded, so did public interest in Marjory. But an excerpt from her diaries is the first in Revelations: Diaries of Women, a 1974 anthology with a fascinating range.
This has caused me to download a book for the first time to my tablet. I can't wait to read all of it, thank you for this!
posted by annieb at 2:53 PM on March 21, 2022
posted by annieb at 2:53 PM on March 21, 2022
What an incredible thing to behold.
posted by Baby_Balrog at 4:09 PM on March 21, 2022
posted by Baby_Balrog at 4:09 PM on March 21, 2022
so... i may have tracked down a first edition copy and bought it.
i have issues.
the first step is admitting that you have a problem.
the second step involves, i think, compulsively purchasing antiquarian books from obscure websites, or at least that's the step i appear to be stuck on?
posted by Baby_Balrog at 12:43 PM on March 24, 2022 [2 favorites]
i have issues.
the first step is admitting that you have a problem.
the second step involves, i think, compulsively purchasing antiquarian books from obscure websites, or at least that's the step i appear to be stuck on?
posted by Baby_Balrog at 12:43 PM on March 24, 2022 [2 favorites]
It arrived in absolutely pristine condition. It looks like most of the pages haven't even been cut.
What a treasure.
posted by Baby_Balrog at 7:55 AM on March 26, 2022
What a treasure.
posted by Baby_Balrog at 7:55 AM on March 26, 2022
That is wonderful! I'm so glad you enjoyed this and that you found that volume in such good shape!
I feel some kind of way about the men writing about her in that book, and Twain as well. It's interesting the way that they take her thoughts seriously -- in a perfectly whimsical sense -- as representative of the growing human mind. And yet they suggest, sidelong, that it's better that Marjory did not get old because her "ardent nature" could have led to "disaster." She could be interesting as a human thinker when she was a child, but not if she were a woman, which she never got to be. I am sure a Victorianist has written about this in some paper that I don't have.
The story of Marjory Fleming is not all that relevant today, I guess, except in one particular lesson: get your damn kids their shots. She would absolutely not have had to have been sick today, unless she lived out in California or Oregon where people are making mistakes again. But if you're on Metafilter, I suppose you know all this already.
posted by Countess Elena at 8:31 AM on March 26, 2022
I feel some kind of way about the men writing about her in that book, and Twain as well. It's interesting the way that they take her thoughts seriously -- in a perfectly whimsical sense -- as representative of the growing human mind. And yet they suggest, sidelong, that it's better that Marjory did not get old because her "ardent nature" could have led to "disaster." She could be interesting as a human thinker when she was a child, but not if she were a woman, which she never got to be. I am sure a Victorianist has written about this in some paper that I don't have.
The story of Marjory Fleming is not all that relevant today, I guess, except in one particular lesson: get your damn kids their shots. She would absolutely not have had to have been sick today, unless she lived out in California or Oregon where people are making mistakes again. But if you're on Metafilter, I suppose you know all this already.
posted by Countess Elena at 8:31 AM on March 26, 2022
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