The Memoirs of Miss Sidney Bidulph

The Memoirs of Miss Sidney Bidulph
Author: Frances Sheridan
Publisher: Broadview Press
Total Pages: 545
Release: 2011-06-06
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1551113430

The Memoirs of Miss Sidney Bidulph was hugely popular in circulating libraries in the years after its publication, and its emotional intensity was often remarked upon; Samuel Johnson wrote to Frances Sheridan, “I know not, Madam! that you have a right, upon moral principles, to make your readers suffer so much.” Sheridan traces Sidney Bidulph’s development in a complex epistolary novel spanning much of the protagonist’s life, and explores the tension between sexual desire and prescribed female conduct. In addition to an introduction that places the novel in the context of Sheridan’s feminism and of the early novel, this edition provides material on discourses of female conduct, letters between Sheridan and Samuel Richardson, and contemporary reviews.

Conclusion of the Memoirs of Miss Sidney Bidulph

Conclusion of the Memoirs of Miss Sidney Bidulph
Author: Frances Sheridan
Publisher: Broadview Press
Total Pages: 335
Release: 2013-09-23
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1554810264

In 1761, Frances Sheridan published her novel The Memoirs of Miss Sidney Bidulph, which became a popular and widely praised example of the sentimental novel. The Conclusion, that novel’s sequel, is set eight years later, after Sidney Bidulph’s marriage and motherhood. Psychologically subtle and emotionally immediate, the novel is told almost entirely in the form of letters. Many of the letters are between the scheming Sophy and Edward Audley, who are trying to trick Sidney’s daughter into marriage with Edward; these letters provide a startlingly realistic portrayal of villainy, anticipating such later works as Les Liaisons Dangereuses. The historical appendices include documents on the education of young adults in the eighteenth century and contemporary reviews of the novel.