Elizabeth Helme


Elizabeth Helme was a prolific English novelist, educational writer, and translator active in the late 18th and early 19th centuries.
File:Title page of Elizabeth Helme's St. Clair of the Isles Vol I - 1803.jpg|thumb|Title page of Elizabeth Helme's St. Clair of the Isles: or, The outlaws of Barra, a Scottish tradition Vol I

Life

Elizabeth Helme was likely born in County Durham, England, to a family tentatively identified by the name of Horrobin. Her family moved to London, where she met William Helme, who became her husband in 1772. They had five children. One of their daughters, Elizabeth Somerville, herself became a novelist. Elizabeth Helme is also known to have worked as a teacher, and her translations included two children's plays by Joachim Heinrich Campe: Cortez and Pizarro, and much of her writing was aimed for younger readers.

Writing

Helme published her first, anonymous novel, Louisa; or, The Cottage on the Moor in 1787, and it remained one of her most successful publications Her work first appeared under her own name with The Farmer of Inglewood Forest, published by the popular Minerva Press in 1796.
Despite both she and her husband working as headmistress and schoolmaster, respectively, at Brentford, and her considerable literary output, the family suffered continual financial difficulties and the Royal Literary Society retain records of various applications for assistance, including one from novelist Lucy Peacock to help with Helme's burial in 1814.
In 1838, Elizabeth Polack based her play St. Clair on Helme's novel St Clair of the Isles.
She is one of the "lost" women writers listed by Dale Spender in Mothers of the Novel: 100 Good Women Writers Before Jane Austen.

Works

Novels

  • Louisa; or the Cottage on the Moor
  • Clara and Emmeline: or, the Maternal Benediction
  • Duncan and Peggy; a Scottish Tale
  • The Farmer of Inglewood Forest
  • Albert, or The Wilds of Strathnavern
  • St Margaret's Cave: or, The Nun's Story. An Ancient Legend
  • St Clair of the Isles
  • The Pilgrim of the Cross, or Chronicles of Christabelle de Mowbray
  • Magdalen, or The Penitent of Godstow
  • ''Modern Times; or, The Age We Live In ''

    Non-fiction works

  • Instructive rambles in London, and the adjacent villages. Designed to amuse the mind, and improve the understanding of youth.
  • Instructive Rambles Extended
  • The History of Scotland: Related in Familiar Conversations, by a Father to His Children
  • The History of England, Related in Familiar Conversations, by a Father to His Children
  • Maternal Instruction or Family Conversations on Moral and Entertaining Subjects
  • The History of Rome from the Foundation of the City to the Fall of the Eastern Empire
  • ''The Fruits of Reflection; or, Moral Remembrances on Various Subjects. Designed for the perusal of youth''

    Translations

  • Travels from the Cape of Good-Hope, into the Interior Parts of Africa
  • St. Alma, a novel
  • Cortez: or, The Conquest of Mexico, as related by a father to his children
  • Pizarro; or, the conquest of Peru, as related by a father to his children
  • ''Columbus; or, The discovery of America, as related by a father to his children''

    Resources

  • Blain, Virginia, et al., eds. The Feminist Companion to Literature in English. London, 1990. 509–10. Print.
  • Font Paz, Carme. 'Owing the Comforts of Life to Art’: Elizabeth Helme’s Critical Reception and the Practice of Writing. ENTHYMEMA: International Journal of Literary Criticism, Literary Theory, and Philosophy of Literature, Vol. 31, pp. 101–113. https://doi.org/10.54103/2037-2426/19003
  • "Helme, Elizabeth." British Travel Writing
  • "Helme, Elizabeth." Orlando: Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present. Retrieved 9 July 2022.
  • "Helme, Elizabeth." The Women's Print History Project, 2019, Person ID 197. Retrieved 9 July 2022.