The Corvey Novels Project at the University of Nebraska

— Studies in British Literature of the Romantic Period —

 

Mary Meeke

"Gabrielli." Independence: a Novel. 4 vols.

London: Lane and Newman, 1802.

 

Contemporary Reviews of Independence:

 

New Annual Register or General Repository of History, Politics, and Literature. Ch. 3. 1802: 322.

Independence by Gabrielli...the hero of which is by turns a mountebank, a rope-dancer, and an English peer, without any pretentions to the latter rank of society, or any pre-eminent [sic] dexterity for either of the former.



The Critical Review. February 1803: 237.

The principal circumstance in this novel is, that the hero acts, for a series of years, the mountebank, and then turns out to be a peer. The performance, in general, deserves as much praise as is due to most works of this nature; for the narrative is not without interest, though at times a little too prolix. If we were to find any fault, it would be, that Egbert Irwan had not been left as he was found; for he certainly is a superior genius, as a Flemish rope dancer: but there is nothing worth commending about him, as a British Marquis.

-Prepared by Stephen P. Sizemore, University of Nebraska, December 2002.