Recent acquisitions: British women writers

Recent additions to Special Collections’ Victorian and Edwardian Literature Collections include works by Alice Meynell and May Sinclair, two women writers whose careers spanned the late Victorian and Edwardian periods.

Alice Meynell (1847-1922) began her career as a poet.  She was also an essayist and literary critic.  After her marriage, she assisted her husband in editing several periodicals, for which she wrote many of her essays.  In her last years, Meynell took up poetry again.  The Shepherdess (1914) collects some of these later poems.  Special Collections’ copy of this book is a presentation copy from Meynell, dated November 1914.

May Sinclair (1863-1946) began her writing career with the intent to be a poet and philosopher.  However, she quickly made her mark as a novelist, particularly a novelist who wrote insightfully and frankly about women’s experiences.  Sinclair’s interest in feminism and in the field of psychoanalysis contributed to the narratives of her novels.   The Dark Night (1924) is a novel in verse, which was issued in both a limited run of 350 copies and a commercial run.  Special Collections’ copy is from the limited edition and is signed by the author.