Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister

Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister
Titlepage of the first edition of the first volume
AuthorAnonymous
LanguageEnglish
GenreEpistolary novel
PublisherJoseph Hindmarsh
Publication date
1684, 1685, 1687
Publication placeEngland
Media typePrint

Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister is a three-volume roman à clef by Aphra Behn playing with events of the Monmouth Rebellion and exploring the genre of the epistolary novel. The first volume, published in 1684, lays some claim to be the first English novel. Some scholars claim that the attribution to Behn remains in dispute.[1] [2] The novel is "based loosely on an affair between Ford, Lord Grey of Werke, and his wife's sister, Lady Henrietta Berkeley, a scandal that broke in London in 1682".[3] It was originally published as three separate volumes: Love-Letters Between a Noble-Man and his Sister (1684), Love-Letters from a Noble Man to his Sister: Mixt with the History of Their Adventures. The Second Part by the Same Hand (1685), and The Amours of Philander and Silvia (1687). The copyright holder was Joseph Hindmarsh,[4] later joined by Jacob Tonson.

The novel has been of interest for several reasons. First, some argue that it is the first novel in English.[5] Its connection to Behn means that it has been the subject of a number of books and articles, especially considering Behn's role in the development of the novel and amatory fiction. Secondly, its commentary on the political scandal of the times demonstrate the ways that amatory fiction interprets political appetite and ambition as sexual lasciviousness.[6][7][8]

  1. ^ Orr, Leah (January 2013). "Attribution Problems in the Fiction of Aphra Behn". The Modern Language Review. 108 (1): 40–51. doi:10.5699/modelangrevi.108.1.0030. S2CID 164127170.
  2. ^ Todd, Janet (1995). ""Pursue that Way of Fooling, and Be Damn'd": Editing Aphra Behn". Studies in the Novel. 27 (3): 304–319. JSTOR 29533072.
  3. ^ Pollak, Ellen (2003). Incest & The English Novel, 1684-1814. Baltimore, Maryland: The Johns Hopkins University Press. p. 59. ISBN 978-0801872044.
  4. ^ "Joseph Hindmarsh (Biographical details)". The British Museum. Retrieved 9 July 2017.
  5. ^ Gardiner, Judith Kegan (Autumn 1989). "The First English Novel: Aphra Behn's Love Letters, The Canon, and Women's Tastes". Tulsa Studies in Women's Literature. 8 (2): 201–222. doi:10.2307/463735. JSTOR 463735.
  6. ^ Bowers, Toni (2011). Force or Fraud: British Seduction Stories and the Problem of Resistance, 1660-1760. Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780199592135.
  7. ^ Ballaster, Ros (1992). Seductive Forms: Women's Amatory Fiction from 1684 to 1740. Clarendon Press. ISBN 9780198184775.
  8. ^ Steen, Francis F. (2002). "The Politics of Love: Propaganda and Structural Learning in Aphra Behn's Love-Letters between a Nobleman and His Sister". Poetics Today. 23 (2): 91–122. doi:10.1215/03335372-23-1-91. S2CID 144125436.