Sarah Green

[anon.] Romance Readers and Romance Writers: A Satirical Novel. 3 vols.

London: T. Hookham, Junior, and E. T. Hookham, 1810.

 

Synopsis of Romance Readers and Romance Writers

This story begins with three brothers, Ralph, Charles, and Edward Marsham, who all live on a farmland estate owned by Ralph. Edward had two daughters, Margaret and Mary. Margaret is an avid reader of romance novels and is not nearly as well kempt as her sister Mary, who is extremely beautiful. While Margaret does read romance novels and delights in their moral virtues, she does not lend as much credence to them as her beautiful sister, who lets the haughty stories control her every action and speech, so much so, in fact, that most people, including her uncles, shudder at her presence.

One day, Edward, who is a Reverend, receives a letter from his superior, a nobleman named Reverend Leslie, saying that he will be coming, along with an entourage, to the area. The family eagerly prepares for their arrival, especially the sisters. Among the party there is Sir Charles Sefton, Lady Caroline Leslie, the wife of the Reverend Leslie, her sister Lady Isabella, her suitor, Fredric Harrington, and his uncle Sir Edward Harrington. Upon the party's arrival, the two sisters are both smitten with two of the men from the group, Mary with Fredric, and Margaret with Sir Charles Sefton, though both of these men are in fact vying for the affection of Lady Isabel, a very sprightly and enchanting woman, who is also an atheist. It isn't long before the family is invited to a ball at the estate of Rev. Leslie.

At this ball, Mary happens to come across the dressing room of Fredric, who answers the door half naked. Despite the state of his clothing, he escorts her to the dining room. The pair develop a strange connection, and Mary is over-taken immediately. Then they run into the Lady Isabell, who from the beginning has disliked Mary, because Mary rivaled her beauty. Now that she saw Fredric with Mary, Lady Isabel became quite enraged. It should be noted that Lady Isabell had altogether rejected Fredric's attempts to woo her, and instead was in love with a man named Major Raymond of the Queen's army, and that she also harbored affection for Fredric's uncle, Sir Edward.

At the same time, though, Lady Isabel readily accepted Margaret because her gaudy tones (though not reflected in her outward appearance) and her impressionable mind were enticing to Lady Isabel, who wanted to impart her philosophies to anyone who would succumb. As the party continues, Fredric outright ignores Mary, instead giving all his attention to Lady Isabel, until after the ball when he confesses to a very proud and seemingly indifferent Mary that he had to ignore her because of her base position, but that he had amorous feelings for her. Margaret was chasing attention from Sir Charles though most of his went to the wooing of Lady Isabel.

At the end of the first volume, the two girls have their fortunes read by a friend of Lady Caroline: the authoress, Mrs. Kennedy. Many believe that Mrs. Kennedy was consorting with the devil and meddling in the Black Arts. She told the two girls, with surprising accuracy, that the two men from whom they seek affection, will one day love them in return, and they will both be wed.

Volume Two begins with a shift in the girls' attitudes. The sensible Mary is now swept away in romantic poems and novels and speaks in the same hyperbolic language that Margaret is described as using at the beginning. Meanwhile, the sensitive Margaret is now reading the literature given to her by Lady Isabel, and she now is beginning to take a more vested interest in her looks, and less in romantic reading, which actually disgusts her now.

Meanwhile, Lady Isabel is plotting a deceitful plan to elope with her lover Major Raymond. The first step of this ploy is to perfidiously persuade Margaret that Sir Charles is in love her and that he wants to arrange a secret marriage. She entices Charles to play along with this, with the promise of a marriage, which Sir Charles promptly announces to all.

Lady Isabel intends on carrying out her designs at another masquerade ball. The Lady will be dressed as a Pilgrim and Margaret like a shepherdess. Isabel's secret love is also attending, dressed as a friar, and Sir Charles is disguised as a Turk. Lady isabel has masks delivered to the ball in the name of royal woman who is to attend, under the pretense that it will make her highness happy if the company had on these fine masks. Isabel, once this has been carried out, changes costumes with Margaret and has Sir Charles convince her lover Major Raymond (who of course already knows the plan) to switch their costumes as a joke. All the transformed characters are revealed to each other, so that it will appear to the company that Sir Charles is still with his bride to be, Isabel, when he is in fact with Margaret (carrying out his obligation in order to marry Isabel), and that the Major Raymond is after Margaret, when in fact the two lovers will be able to escape and elope before anyone knows what has happened. The plan works to perfection and is only revealed when Mary faints at a letter her father sent. When the pilgrim (Margaret) ran to her sister's side and comforted her with sisterly love, it prompted the company to allow everyone to reveal their identities to one another. It was then realized by all that Isabel and Major Raymond were gone and had eloped. The letter that had made Mary faint explained that Rev. Marsham, the girls' father, needed them home immediately because there had been a potentially fatal accident.

Upon returning to their home, the girls discover that Fredric Harrington had been shot. Two men dressed in strange uniforms had attended the ball and were arguing vociferously. Neither wishing to yield to one another and both being very drunk, they decided that a duel would be the only way to settle their bitter acrimony. Rev. Marsham caught wind of their intentions and rushed to stop them, but too late. Fredric Harrington lay shot in a field and one of the officers from his regiment sat by him, remorseful though still not knowing whom he had wounded. Rev. Marsham begged the man to leave, that his life might be spared and that he would be granted long years to dedicate his life to repentance and the service of Jesus Christ. Rev. Marsham returns to his cottage with Fredric and the town's practitioner. The doctor, a very respected man in his community, and very adept with previous patients at foretelling the onset of death (he was a croaker), had proclaimed that the wound was mortal and that Fredric would not live till morning. Fredric's uncle, Sir Edward, refused to believe this assessment from what he thought was an inexperienced doctor, and sent to London for a proper surgeon. This London doctor, a dear friend of Sir Edward's, comes immediately. Upon his first assessment of the young Fredric, he declares that he will live, and that his wound was simply made worse by fever and ill temper. Rev. Edward informs his daughters that they must perform meritoriously in nursing Fredric back to health. It eventually becomes apparent that the only time Fredric is happy, or smiling, is when Mary is waiting on him.

Meanwhile, Sir Charles had absconded almost immediately upon the realization that he'd been played like a cheap violin. Charles Marsham left to join the fighting against Napoleon sometime before all this, and was therefore ignorant of all these events, and Isabel and Raymond (who had eloped) now returned to seek the forgiveness from Isabel's relatives. She was immediately forgiven though Major Raymond was certainly not, and in fact he was barred from the Reverend Leslie's estate. This was quite upsetting to the free-minded Isabel, who became determined to never see or talk to her father again…after he'd given her the fortune that he owed, that is. Eventually, Rev. Leslie gave her the money in order to maintain some semblance of good tidings with his daughter when she left with Major Raymond to join his regiment, where she was quite enamored with Raymond and their marriage initially. But, as soon as the novelty off their marriage had worn off, they lived quite unhappily together, in an expensive house that Isabel demanded Raymond buy, essentially putting him in debt he could never repay.

Meanwhile, Fredric's health worsened, and on his deathbed he asks Mary to be his wife, and they are married. Fredric's uncle would never have allowed this wedding (though he greatly liked Mary) except for the fact that Fredric was so closed to the grave, and it may have been his dying wish. Not long after, much to Sir Edward's happiness, his nephew's health returned, and his marriage to Mary was quite as strong as he now appeared. Sir Edward immediately begins to formulate, falsely, that Mary and her relatives had laid plans to effect this disapprovable union.

Margaret is lost in all the commotion; thus she has no one, no suitors, no friends, and now cries all day long. She turns from her once beloved novels in absolute disgust. She calls herself the "wretched Margaret," and feels a tremendous amount of sorrow for herself, until a servant boy named Phelim O'Gurphy, on whom she used to have a crush (and convinced herself that he was actually descended from ancient Irish kings, but was simply gaining worldly knowledge by being a servant) came to the house, and because of her pining for love/friendship, she became even more sure that he was of noble blood and thus reinstated him in her heart upon firmer ground than ever.

Uncle Ralph, one day, while driving his carriage, accidentally runs it off the side of a small cliff, and he was thrown from the coach. The horse slipped from the edge of the cliff as well and the beast's full weight came down on top of Ralph, crushing him. Two men, who witnessed the accident, carried him back to the farmhouse, directed by a letter in Ralph's pocket. The men were from London -- a very, very, wealthy man, and his servant. When Ralph was looked over by Edward and the two men back at the cottage, it was evident that he would not live long. Before he died he pointed to an escritoire, with as much fervor as he could muster, and then laid back passed from this world.

The rich man from London, Mr. Davenport, it turns out is married to a woman named Emily Madison Davenport, who before she was married was excellent friends with Rev. Edward's dead wife. It was agreed that Emily would return soon and take Margaret to live with them to lavish in the spoils of luxury for a while since she was so unhappy -- though after she stayed with the Davenports for a while, it was apparent that her humble background was causing the friends of the Davenports, who always seemed to be calling and were very uppity, to be quite unpleasant toward her, and she had trouble adjusting. All this was confounded when Sir Charles Sefton, who had broken her heart when he left her without a word, called one day.

The significance of Ralph Marsham's dying gesture is made apparent in his living will, in which it turns out he had a child, a boy named Mathew Marsham who lived in a village not terribly far from Ralph's estate. A letter was sent to inform the Mathew and his mother of his inheritance, and it wasn't long before he had appeared to collect his estate. He was quite a handsome boy and extremely amiable; he begged Mr. Marsham to stay on the land, and shuddered at the thought of driving the Reverend from his home of so long just because his father died. Edward becomes very fond of Mathew and a great friendship blossoms. Meanwhile, Fredric and Mary, who live nearby, are beginning to feel the sameness of their marriage. Fredric decides to take leave of Mary, under the pretense that he should leave her to mourn properly for her uncle, when in fact he means to indulge in the fancy life style he'd given up to marry a farm girl. Volume two ends with Edward Marsham returning to his home to find Mathew teary eyed, poring over a packet of papers.

Volume three begins with Fredric's absence. While he is gone, his love for Mary, at first is reaffirmed, and he sends her letters with every post…but while he is living it up with his friends, they are all are invited to yet another ball put on by a Lord Fenwater, and who should be there but the lovely Lady Isabel Raymond? Of course by this point Fredric, who is very weak minded, and Lady Isabel who despises her husband, realize that truly love one another, and it isn't long before Fredric becomes a "criminal husband," and Isabel, a "guilty wife." Sir Edward had caught wind of this affair and wrote immediately to Fredric to stop his amorous carrying-on, for fear of shame, but Fredric would not be swayed. Weeks go by and Fredric's letters grow distant and cold. He tells his uncle that he'll be staying in Cromer indefinitely and Sir Edward then becomes intent upon keeping the truth from Mary, for fear that it may destroy her.

Meanwhile, Sir Charles, who is a guest of the Davenports in his bitterness, is still intent upon the "destruction of Margaret's youthfulness." This time he informs her that he loves her but abhors marriage, and tries to convince her to feel the same. He is very persuasive and tells her that his love cannot be explained by some clergyman's vows. This makes Mrs. Davenport (who has an openly infidelous relationship with her husband) extremely jealous, and her care for Margaret is greatly affected. Mrs. Davenport decides to leave for some time, and in her absence Sir Charles bribes a chamber maid allow him into Margaret's room, where he spends the night.

In the meantime, Mathew's letter at the end of Volume two, it appears, explains his life and inheritance…it was sent by his mother, whom under a condition of the letter being delivered must be dead.

Elsewhere, Isabel and Fredric have run off together and it is now all over every major newspaper. Sir Charles can no longer keep the truth from Mary, and she is inconsolable. Sir Edward tries to comfort her, telling her that he will see that Fredric returns to her and is humbled so much that he will never so much as get the post without her by his side.

Margaret, distressed by her sister's misfortune seeks out Sir Charles, only to find out from his house-servant that he is absent and will be for some time, and that when he returns, he is to be married! He never does marry, however, and eventually leaves England for the Island of Madeira…leaving Margaret with a child. He eventually succumbed to his vices, and died on that island, but not before leaving Margaret one thousand pounds, and her child, two thousand.

Uncle Charles eventually returned from his service to Great Britain a hero and a gentleman, and much delighted was his family to have him back during such troubling times.

Isabel and Fredric eventually separated, and Fredric, as promised, was returned to Mary a humble, penitent man. They eventually move out of their village and settle down in a rural area. Fredric, who is overjoyed to be with Mary, and completely shamed, never thinks of emancipation again. Isabel also retires to a rural community, where she gives up her gaudy, licentious ways, and begins her reformation by corresponding with Rev. Marsham, for consultation and religious advice.

- Prepared by William England, University of Nebrtaska, December 2002