Susan Evance (later Hooper, fl. 1808 – 1818) was an English romantic poet. Her poems focus on sentiment, often with melancholy themes, and also reveal her religious convictions and socially progressive ideals.[1][2][3] She is noted for her use of the sonnet form, following the legacy of Charlotte Smith as part of the English Romantic revival of that form.[4][5] Her sonnets on decay, especially on the ruin of Netley Abbey, have been considered Gothic in tone.[6][7][8][9]
Most of Evance’s biographical details are inferred from her poems: she had sisters and a brother in the navy; and she was said to be young when her first book was published.[10] Between the publications of her first and second books she married a Mr Hooper.[11] By 1818 she seems to have been a mother.[11]
She published Poems... Selected from her Earliest Productions, to Those of the Present Year in 1808 and A Poem Occasioned by the Cessation of Public Mourning for Her Royal Highness the Princess Charlotte; together with Sonnets and Other Productions in 1818. She also contributed to A Sequel to the Poetical Monitor, consisting of pieces select and origin adapted to improve the minds and manners of young persons in 1811.[11]