The Works of Lady Caroline Lamb

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Editors: Leigh Wetherall Dickson and Paul Douglass

The Pickering Masters

This is the first scholarly critical edition of the works of Lady Caroline Lamb (1785–1828), the late Romantic-era novelist now most famous for her adulterous affair with Lord Byron. Her first novel, Glenarvon, is a scandalous roman à clef which hinges upon the relationship’s break-up. However, it also indicts Lamb’s friends and family as a morally bankrupt and ineffective aristocracy. Her familiarity with and criticism of the power structures of her time, mean that her novels deserve to be viewed within their wider cultural and historical contexts.

From birth, the intersecting worlds of politics and fashion surrounded Lamb. She was born into the heart of the ultra-cosmopolitan, politically frustrated Whig opposition. She was married to William Lamb, later Lord Melbourne and first prime minister to Queen Victoria. Her aunt was Georgiana, fifth Duchess of Devonshire. The Prince Regent was godfather to her only son. Her intellectual endeavours were supported by Edward and Rosina Bulwer Lytton, William Godwin, Lady Morgan, Amelia Opie, Elizabeth Benger and Elizabeth Spence. Culturally, she is an influential link between second-generation Romantic and first-generation Victorian writers.

This is the first edition to present Lamb’s works in a scholarly format. Graham Hamilton and Ada Reis have never been republished, and Gordon: A Tale has been misattributed to Byron. This edition will appeal to scholars of Romanticism and Women’s Writing.

• Situates Lamb’s literary achievements within the wider context of her Whig allegiances, her sense of noblesse oblige and her promotion of aristocratic reform
• Ada Reis and Graham Hamilton have never been republished before, Gordon: A Tale has been wrongly attributed to Byron
• All texts are newly reset and editorial material includes a general introduction, volume introductions, headnotes and endnotes.

Sample pages

• Volume 1: sample pages with notes
• Volume 2: sample pages with notes

Contents

Volume 1

Glenarvon (1816)
The famously scandalous roman à clef that not only hinged upon Lamb’s adulterous relationship with Lord Byron, but also indicted Lamb’s immediate circle of friends and extended family as a dissolute and ineffective aristocracy. Set during the 1798 Irish uprising, Lamb offers a sympathetic view of republicanism at a time of anti-republican feeling.

Volume 2

Graham Hamilton (1822)
Owing a debt to Frances Burney’s Evelina, which Lamb fully acknowledges, Graham Hamilton is a young man’s entry into the dazzling but dissolute sphere of London society. With money at his disposal, unlike much of his new acquaintance, the eponymous hero struggles to maintain his integrity whilst trying to salvage the reputation of an inveterate lady gambling addict, based upon Lamb’s mother, Lady Bessborough, and her beloved aunt, Georgiana, the 5th Duchess of Devonshire.

Poems
Poems From Letters: I’m Mad; To Georgiana; The Wand Was Broke her Elves Dismiss'd; They Took From Me My Cherub Boy; Says a Smile To a Tear; The Sun With Bright Tough Parting Ray; On Farewell; Vacant that Heart; When Return’d To His Home; May No Sad Dreams; Friend Of My Heart Accept This Letter; The Cowslip & the Lemon Pale; Like a Fair Fruit Peach that Never Has Been Tasted; I've Been Nearly In a Teff; Oh Hartington Thou Base Deceiver; Death Soon Perhaps At Once Each Prospect Ending; Ye Sprites that Roam on Earth; Once Were His Thoughts As Spotless Pure & True; Sweet Was the Voice that Sang of Truth & Love; Since I No Longer Little John Can Send; Then Since It Is So Wilt Thou Then Leave Me For Ever; Oh that Like Thee Childe Harold I had Power; Cousin Of Mine Thy Verses Stray & Quaint; By Those Eyes Whose Sweet Expression: To the Tune of Hear Me Swear How Much I Love; Cold Was the Season Of the Year; Idole.

Poems from a Gift Book in the Hertfordshire Archives: To Love & To Be Loved; Friendship Is Stronger; Oh Sing Again!; After Many a Well Fought Day; On Going to Paris & Leaving Off Trains; French Man Smile; Gage d’Amour; To a Lanky Cur I Lov’d at that Time; Oh that Angels Wings; From Hippolitus By Euripides; On a Story of a Poor Girl Returned to Her Parents; Winged With Hope; ‘Twas Because To Raise the Flame; Hope a Glimmering Star Appear’d; Ah What Means that Frowning Brow; Love Grew Pale & Half Opprest; Vain Thy Anger, Vain Thy Care; Hard as It Is Through Life’s Rough Seas To Steer; A Little Lamb There Was that From Its Birth; Why Are Hills & Vallies Green.

Additional Poems from a Gift Book for Georgiana, Lady Morpeth, in the Castle Howard Archives: On Erins Shore, My Native Clime; And Thee Amanda – Thee Whose Lovely Mind; Sport While the Years Are Thine and While Ye May; Tis Late and I Must Haste Away; Sweet Sylph Of Air If ’Tis Thy Pinion Light; Soon After My Departure From Belmont Castle; A Heart So Tender & a Form So Fair [On William Lamb]; Come, Painter, Friendship Asks Thy Care; Why Were My Eyes Not Formd Like Hers Of Blue; To C[aroline], Singing & Playing On the Harp; Love Like the Morning Sun In Radiance Bright; The Spirit Monalba's Song.

Verses from Glenarvon (1816): O Loudly Sing the Pillalu: Irish Lament; The Task to Tell thy Fate, Be Mine; This Heart Has Never Stoop’d Its Pride: Glenarvon’s Song; Waters of Elle To the air of Ils ne sont plus; Farewell; By That Smile Which Made Me Blest: To the Air of Hear Me Swear How Much I love; My Heart’s Fit to Break: St. Clara’s Song; And Can’st Thou Bid My Heart Forget: To Glenarvon: Elinor’s Song; To a Mendicant: Poor Wretch! Who Hast Nothing Hope For In Life; Curs’d Be the Fiend’s Detested Art: St. Clara’s Prophecy; When Turf and Faggots Crackling Blaze; For the Heart that Has Once Been Estrang’d; If To Lose All that Love Thee Should E’er Be Thy Lot.

Long Poems: A New Canto (1819); Gordon: A Tale: A Poetical Review of Don Juan (1821).

Verses from Graham Hamilton (1822) and Ada Reis (1823): Thou Would’st Not Do What I have Done; Sir Henry De Vaux; What I am – May’st Thou Never Know; Remorse Feeds On My Heart In the Still Night; Sing Not For Others, But For Me; Weep for What Thou Hast Lost, Love; The Kiss That’s On Thy Lip Impress’d [Duet].

Additional Verses from Isaac Nathan’s Fugitive Pieces and Reminiscences of Lord Byron. . . also Some Original Poetry, Letter and Recollections of Lady Caroline Lamb: As the Flower Early Gathered, Whilst Fresh in Its Bloom; William Lamb’s Return From Paris, Asking Me My Wish; After Many a Well Fought Day; Amidst the Flowers Rich and Gay; To William Lamb; Would I had seen thee Dead and Cold; Let The Harp Be Mute For Ever; If a Dark Wretch E’er Stray’d; Little Birds in Yonder Grove; Lines to Harriet Wilson; Verses Printed in the Annuals; To the Hon. William Lamb; To a Friend, on Sending a Fancy Drawing, After Promising Her Own Picture in the Character of a Gypsey; Invocation to Sleep; Woman’s Love.

Volume 3

Ada Reis, A Tale (1823)
An Oriental, apocalyptic tale that sees the eponymous character awaiting the fulfilment of a Faustian pact with the devil for himself and his daughter, which comes true with a predictably double edged accuracy. His daughter does indeed wear an imperial crown, but as the Queen of Hell with a distinctly Byronic consort. However, this Hell, recognisably influenced by Milton’s Paradise Lost, Dante’s Inferno and Beckford’s Vathek, is constructed to Lamb’s own unique specifications; based upon the architecture of Devonshire House, this is a distinctively aristocratic Hell, where their sins of the abuse of power and privilege are punished and in which Lamb makes an appearance as herself.

Reviews

'This is a valuable set for those interested in early-19th-century literary, social, or women's studies. Highly recommended.'
– N Fruman, CHOICE

Related titles

• Silver Fork Novels, 1826–1841
• The Collected Letters of Rosina Bulwer Lytton
• The Unpublished Letters of Thomas Moore

Leaflets

• The Works of Lady Caroline Lamb: colour leaflet
• The Works of Lady Caroline Lamb: printable leaflet

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