Sukey Vickery
Sukey Vickery was an early 19th-century American writer born in Leicester, Massachusetts. She gained recognition for her literary contributions, particularly through her poetry published under the pseudonym "Fidelia" in the Massachusetts Spy's column "Blossoms of Parnassus." In 1803, she published her novel, "Emily Hamilton: A Novel Founded on Incidents in Real Life," which was notable for its epistolary format, utilizing over seventy letters to detail the lives and relationships of female characters. Vickery's writing reflects the complexities of female friendships and societal expectations regarding women, as she critiqued the double standards in sexual conduct between genders.
Despite the personal nature of her writing—claiming to have worked during her leisure time and emphasizing its basis in real-life stories—her novel struggled commercially and was not reprinted due to insufficient profits. Vickery married Samuel Watson in 1804 and transitioned to family life, raising nine children while ceasing her public literary endeavors. However, she continued to document her thoughts privately through diaries and letters, some of which are preserved at the American Antiquarian Society. Vickery's work and her experiences provide insight into the challenges and societal norms faced by women writers in her era.
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Subject Terms
Sukey Vickery
Fiction Writer
- Born: June 12, 1779
- Birthplace: Leicester, Massachusetts
- Died: June 17, 1821
- Place of death: Leicester, Massachusetts
Biography
Born in Leicester, Massachusetts, to Benjamin and Susannah Barter Vickery, Sukey Vickery spent some time at the Leicester Academy, where she acquired familiarity with the classics. Between 1801 and 1803, she published poems in a column titled, “Blossoms of Parnassus,” for the Massachusetts Spy. The newspaper’s publisher, Isaiah Thomas, was also to publish her novel, Emily Hamilton: A Novel Founded on Incidents in Real Life (1803).
Vickery used the pseudonym Fidelia for her poetry, but insisted upon complete anonymity when she published her novel. She seems to have shared contemporary suspicions about female novelists. In correspondence with her publisher, Vickery assured him that she had not taken time away from her household duties to write fiction; her writing, she explained, had been done during her leisure time in the evening. Vickery also emphasized that her novel was based on facts and had been drawn from the actual stories of friends and acquaintances.
Emily Hamilton is an epistolary novel using more than seventy letters to relate the stories of the courtships and evolving relationships of Emily Hamilton, Mary Carter, and Eliza Anderson. The novel offers an interesting and impressive record of female friendships. Emily and Mary are the principal correspondents, and after Mary marries Mr. Gray, whose fiancée dies of consumption, the focus is entirely on Emily’s three courtships. She rejects Lambert after learning that he has impregnated and deserted a young woman. Her worthy suitor Charles Devas is not particularly attractive to Emily because she has fallen in love with Edward Belmont, a married man, but she tries to be true to Charles. Everything works out when Edward’s wife dies and Charles, fortuitously, dies at sea. Emily’s emotions are explored and issues of character and conduct are debated.
Vickery allows her characters to examine and criticize prevailing social conventions. Emily and Mary exchange stories of young women who are judged more harshly for sexual indiscretions than their male seducers. Their point of view remains conservative. They want society to impose a stricter code on men, not relax the standards for female behavior.
Vickery’s novel was priced expensively at seventy-five cents and did not sell well. Her publisher Thomas did not make enough profit to justify reprinting. To assist sales, he included a note describing Emily Hamilton as the work of an eighteen-year-old country girl who was supporting her aging parents by sewing and writing. This portrait prompted one reviewer to comment that though he did not want to encourage girls to become authors, he was sympathetic with the youth and circumstances of this author.
One year after the publication of her novel, Vickery married Samuel Watson, who owned a clothier’s establishment in Leicester. They raised two sons and seven daughters, but finances were precarious. Vickery’s literary publication stopped after her marriage, but she seems to have kept a personal diary. Brief fragments dating from 1815 are preserved, along with her letters and poetry, at the American Antiquarian Society in Worcester, Massachusetts.