Author: Evance, Susan (dates uncertain; fl. 1808-18)
Title: Poems . . . Selected from her Earliest Productions, to Those of the Present Year.
Date: 1808
Contemporary Reviews of this Volume
Eclectic Review 5 (April 1809): 381-82. Art. XVIII. Poems, by Miss S. Evance, selected from her earliest Productions to those of the present Year. foolscap 8vo. Pp. 131. Price 5s. Longman and Co. 1809.
As the latest productions of our fair author are not half so fine or so melancholy as her earliest, we think there is some hope of her. Her taste appears to have been sadly corrupted by the poetry of the Della Cruscan school; but we flatter ourselves she may now be reckoned among the converts to simplicity and nature. Her fancy, instead of being stimulated to the production of extravagance and absurdity, will gradually be reduced under good discipline; and her amiable sensibility, employed on the real sorrows and sufferings of others, will no longer be perverted into an instrument of needless torture to herself. Acute feeling is a talent which may easily become a blessing as a curse; and those who possess it are chargeable both with folly and ingratitude, if they make it, either for themselves or others, a source of misery, instead of a means of happiness. While therefore we feel a little indignant at the murmurings and moanings of this lady, who probably knows scarcely any thing of severer ills of life, we are nevertheless constrained to protest against the opinion which she seems to inculcate in the following poem, that a state of mind approaching toward indifference is preferable to a keen sensibility. It is intitled, ‘A Tender Heart.’
["A Tender Heart" quoted in full here]
We will add the ‘Sonnet written at Netley Abbey’, as a furthur specimen of Miss E.’s performances.
["Sonnet written at Netley Abbey" quoted in full here]
Monthly Review 60 (October 1809): 216. Art. 28. Poems, by Miss S. Evance. Crown 8vo. 5s. Boards. Longman and Co.
Although in some of these poems the verse is not smooth enough to convey all the beauty of the ideas, yet many of them display a purity of sentiment and delicacy of feeling which intitle them to a considerable portion of approbation. MIss Evance is not, however, always happy in her comparisons; she talks of a butterfly ‘playful as the waving trees;’ and she sometimes writes in a tone of querulous despair which we hope was not so much a habit of the mind as a transient affection, vanishing with ‘the clouds,’ the ‘dew-drops,’ and ‘the waves,’ that occasioned the lines in which this mournful spirit predominates. When fictitious wretchedness gives way to more rational considerations, she pleases by her power of imagery, her justness of reflection, and her elegance of thought.
Poetical Register 7 (1808): 564. Poems, by Miss S. Evance, selected from her earliest Productions, to those of the Present Year. Small. 8vo. Pp. 131.
The Editor of these poems has not stated the age of Miss Evance, but we suppose that she is young. Her compositions display poetical talent, which deserves to cultivated. The style is unaffected, and the versification indicates that her ear is correct.
British Critic 33 (May 1809): 516-17 Art. II. Poems by Siss S. Evance, Selected from her earliest Productions to these of the present Year. 12mo. Longman and Co. 1808.
We are certainly not among those who are folicitous to bring the productions of young persons, particularly of young females before the scrutiny of the public. The doing so has in our opinion a great tendency to check the progress of improvement in the individuals themselves, by the introduction of self-conceit and vanity, and but very little interest or advantage can be expected by those who eat these unripe fruits. The Poems, however, in this collection are remarkable for their elegance and sensibility, and comprise some of the best qualities of poetical excellence. We subjoin a specimen, though with no particular regard to selection.
["Written at the Commencement of Spring" quoted in full here]
We are sorry to observe such a spirit of melancholy pervade these Poems, as it is to be feared it is awakened by misfortunes, which surely cannot have been merited.
Critical Review s. 3. v. 16. Art. 20 -- Poems by Miss Evance, Selected from her earliest Productions to those of the present Year. Longman. 1808.
These poems seem the production of an elegant but rather desponding mind; they abound with pathos and sentiment. Some of the sonnets are equal to those of Bowles, which they much resemble, and the rest of the poems, which are on various subjects, manifest sensibility, delicacy and taste. We will select one, which is not the best in the collection, but which will serve as a sample of the average merit of the whole.
["A Cottage Scene" quoted in full here]
We hope to have other occasions of noticing the poetical productions of Miss Evance in our literary journal.
Antijacobin Review 33 (July 1809): 296.
Not accessible through Love Library, University of Nebrtaska.
Prepared by Samantha Stuefer, University of Nebraska, April 2018.
© Samantha Stuefer, 2018.