Mary Collyer
Mary Collyer (née Mitchell), born around 1716 or 1717, was an English translator and novelist known for her significant contributions to literature in the 18th century. She married Joseph Collyer, a bookseller and printer, and they had one son, Joseph. Collyer was likely self-educated and demonstrated a strong command of French and German, which was uncommon for women of her time. Her first major work, a translation of Pierre Marivaux's *The Virtuous Orphan*, was notable for transforming its ironic narrative into a more sentimental story, influencing other writers, including Samuel Richardson.
In addition to translations, she authored her own fiction, including the epistolary novel *Felicia to Charlotte*, which contrasted rural values with urban life, emphasizing moral companionship in marriage. This work was popular enough to warrant a sequel. Collyer also ventured into children's literature with *The Christmas Box*, published in two volumes, marking her as an early contributor to this genre. She continued to translate significant works from German, including Salomon Gessner's *The Death of Abel*. Collyer passed away in her mid-forties, leaving behind a legacy that helped pave the way for later feminist literature and children's books.
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Mary Collyer
Writer
- Born: 1716/1717
- Birthplace: England
- Died: 1762 or 1763
- Place of death: Islington, England
Biography
Little is known of Mary Collyer’s (née Mitchell) birth or education. She was born probably in 1716, possibly 1717, and seems to have learned French and German, the latter of which was not a usual foreign language to study. She married Joseph Collyer, a bookseller, printer, and sometime writer who owned a bookshop off Fetter Lane in the Fleet Street area of London. He also ran a small circulating library on Tower Hill, London, although they lived in Islington, at that time an outer suburb of London to the north. They had one child, Joseph, born in 1748. Mary died at forty-six, in either 1762 or early 1763.
Probably largely self-educated, Mary acquired a working knowledge of the English classics as well as contemporary French and German literature. Her first venture into print was her translation of the French writer Pierre Marivaux’s The Virtuous Orphan: Or, The Life of Marianne, Countess of . . . . This was first issued as monthly installments and then as a single volume. Although there were several other attempts at translating this popular work, it was Collyer’s that lasted well into the next century. In fact, it is more than a translation; it is a reworking from Marivaux’s somewhat ironic narration to a much more sentimental and romantic story, with the heroine made much more chaste, winning over by her goodness the aristocratic young man who then becomes her reformed husband. As such, it influenced contemporary writers of the sentimental novel, most famously Samuel Richardson.
This was in 1742. The next year, Collyer brought out a second translation, The Memoirs of the Countess de Bressol, in two volumes. It is a somewhat picaresque, anonymous novel, set around the heroine Genevieve, the countess. The countess has many adventures, including being abducted by pirates. She also meets a series of other interesting women who tell their stories, including Eleanora de Bremieres, who became queen of a tribe of Native South Americans. In some ways, this and Collyer’s subsequent novels laid the basis for the early feminist writings of the end of the eighteenth century.
Collyer’s first attempt at writing her own fiction was an epistolatory novel, a genre just beginning to come into vogue. Felicia to Charlotte: Being Letters from a Young Lady in the Country, to Her Friend in Town was published anonymously in 1744. The title suggests the country-versus-town theme, with the joys of the country being extolled in very romantic terms. However, it is the moral influence of country life, especially in courtship and the choice of a decent husband, that is particularly conveyed. Marriage is redefined strongly as companionship of equal minds and moral values, strongly against the town- and city-based literature of the fashionable center. We see in Collyer’s work that a shift of sensibility is beginning to occur, as well as the discovery of a genre which encourages intimate disclosure. Again, Richardson was to exploit this genre more fully.
So popular was this work that Collyer produced a sequel, Letters from Felicia to Charlotte: Volume Second, published in 1749. This next volume treats the early days of Felicia’s marriage to Lucius. She mentions tenants, the upbringing of children, and again praises the tranquility and moral virtue of the country. Some of the educational sentiments anticipate the writings of Jean-Jacques Rousseau later in the century. The book was popular and received at least four reprints. Collyer also wrote a children’s book, The Christmas Box, again anonymously written and published in two volumes in 1748 and 1749. At the time she published The Christmas Box, printing for children’s literature had barely begun. The Collyers’ Islington fellow printer, Jack Newberry, is credited with having printed the first book specifically written for children just a few years earlier.
After a gap of several years, Collyer began another translation, but from German: Salomon Gessner’s The Death of Abel (1761), a very popular work. She died while working on Friedrich Klopstock’s The Messiah; her husband completed the work. The translations were significant efforts to make German literature known in Britain.