A WOMAN'S VIEW OF DRAMA, 1790-1830:

The Diaries of Anna Margaretta Larpent from the Huntington Library

Publisher's Note

Anna Margaretta Porter (1758-1824) was the daughter of Sir James Porter the diplomat.  Like many young girls she was encouraged to keep a diary which started in earnest in 1773.  In 1782 she became the second wife of John Larpent (1741-1824) who had been appointed Examiner of Plays in England in November 1778.

The Examiner of Plays was an extremely influential figure in the development of drama and was much more powerful than modern censors.  All plays required licensing before performance and the Examiner had the sole power to recommend the issue of licences by the Lord Chamberlain.  [The Licensing Act of 1737 required all new plays to be vetted before performance and the law remained in force until 1968].

Both husband and wife collaborated in the work with the result according to L W Connolly’s study of John Larpent in 1976, that Anna Margaretta Larpent became “practically a Deputy Examiner”.  Most valuably, she recorded her reading, her criticisms and her verdicts in her diary.

What survives is a remarkable record of the reading of an intelligent woman for the late Eighteenth Century to the early Nineteenth Century.  Furthermore, it is the record of a woman who was deliberately reading critically and expressing views on morality and propriety.

This was a period of great success for British Theatre, but also one of great turmoil: a period dominated by Sheridan, the Kembles, Sarah Siddons, and the Keans; a period in which tragedy was brought to new heights and Shakespeare was played with greater historical accuracy; but also a period in which spectacle became more important and in which melodramas were introduced.  A fecund period for writers, the Larpents were faced with a mountainous pile of drama – good and bad – to read through.

Anna Margaretta Larpent was a champion and an admirer of Elizabeth Inchbald (1753-1821) who had made her play-writing debut in 1784 with A Mogul Tale, or The Descent of the Balloon and over 21 years wrote 20 comedies, farces, and translations from French to German including the version of Kotzebue’s Lovers’ Vows (1798) the drama enacted by the Bertram family in Austen’s Mansfield Park and a play in which Larpent saw not “the least Immorality”.

The diary included criticism and many other contemporary female dramatists as well as their male counterparts.

The diary sequence starts in 1790 and Larpent notes:

"I observed much, talked little.  As I grew older I wrote better - the Employment delighted me, and gave spirit to all my occupations.”

The diary provides more than 30 years of sustained dramatic criticism.  John Larpent was succeeded in the post of Examiner by George Colman the Younger (Examiner, 1824-1836), a controversial appointment as one of his own plays had previously been forbidden.  The diary ends in 1830.

This unique source provides critical insights into the development of British Drama, 1790-1830; the role of censorship; and changing values in society.

It illustrates the moral values of the age, and shows how political satire was suppressed.

It also provides a window into the life and reading of an educated society lady from the time of the French Revolution to the Age of Reform:

“Live over my life in this book …

praise me where you can.

Condemn me where you must;

But love me every where if you can.”

Each year has a short one or two page entry providing an overview of “Entries of interest according to dates”, for instance for 1790:

Jan 10 - Dinner for all the children

Jan 14 - Illness of George

Mar 6 - Mrs Jordan in Rosalind

Mar 15 - Method of writing journal.  Mr Rose.

Mar 18 - Mrs Blair

Mar 20 - Mons. Caloure

Mar 23 - Foundling.  William Pitt.

April 7 - Play at Camberwell.

May 2 - Mrs McCormick

May 11- Col. Dauban

Jun 20 - Gaming Houses

Jun 27- Election

(The last entry was 1790 is on 2 July).

These are but just isolated benchmarks.  The diary itself offers much more than these particular events which the author has singled out.

Folios 98-99 of the Journal for 1793 offer a similar list.

Jan 2 - Tranquélèon

Jan 6 - Account of School Dinner

Jan 7 -  Ditto

Jan 9 - Fight between 2 footmen

Jan 13 - Receives Baron Tranquélèon – account of the Duke of Brunswick

Jan 18 - Court show

Jan 22 - Tranquélèon & Bishop of Montpellier

Jan 24 - Rhinoceros

Jan 28 - Anecdotes.  Louis XVI.

Feb 4 - Bishop’s Escape

Mar 19 - Anecdotes

Apr 9 - Raffle

Apr 30 - Account of Madame Précorbin

Jul 1 - Fitzroy Square

Jul 26 - Anecdote

Aug 16 - Miss Burney

Aug 22 - Letter from France

Aug 24 - Immigrant Priest in Hospital

Aug 25 - Bishop of Montpellier

Aug 27- Account of a visit to Portsmouth, Southampton etc.

Sep 1 - Octaheite

Oct 15 - Botany Bay

Oct 17 - Jamaica

Nov 13 - Prophecy

Dec 4 - Letter from Baron de Tranquélèon.

In the same volume opposite folio ’97 is an intriguing list of “Books Useful to Buy” including Mackintosh’s defence of the French Revolution as an Answer to Burke, Vie de Voltaire par Condorcet, and Townsends Travels through Spain.  At the end of volume 2 there is a list of books read in 1798 and a list of those books she would like to buy.

To finish, here are a few early extracts from the Diary to give a flavour of the material:

Volume 1.

Wednesday, 2nd June 1790

“Rose as usual; prayed.  Read for an hour in Guthrie’s History of the World that part relating to France.  Breakfasted.  Entered in the year’s Housebook, the bills of three weeks. - received Mr Ewart for half an hour.  Trimmed a Gown.  Dressed.  Dined as usual at half past 4 O ’Clock.  Drank tea at Lady Bathurst’s; … kept up late of course.”

Many entries for the mid 1790s are full of notes about titles she is reading.  These are quite easy to pick out.

Volume 1.

Thursday, 22nd August 1793

“Rose a little past 7.  Prayed.  Breakfasted.  Read for half an hour in Delia.  Walked to the Panorama.  A View of the Grand Fleet at Portsmouth in 1791.  It is a wonderful deception; certainly the powers of perspective, of the management of Objects – such as putting the view in a hollow round – concealing the Top & termination altogether produce an astonishing effect.  Here we met Mary Ann Larpent who proceeded with us to old Mr. Larpent’s.  She then dined with us.  After Tea came the Bishop of Montpellier & the Baron de T.   Much anxiety about their Friends – the Bishop showed me a letter from Paris sent to him by his friend the Bishop of Nismes now at Constance, from his Sister in Law in which she writes as if she were a Democrate, to avoid suspicion she tells him that her Carriage & Horses are taken from her …”

Volume 1.

April 1st 1795

“The Bishop told me the following Story - A family from Switzerland came to Toulouse in the South of France; they placed a Daughter in a Convent there for Education.  She turned Catholic; then became a Nun – She led a peaceable life till the dispersion of the Convent during these Troubles.  She then wandered into Spain were she was in great Misery but an English Captain of Merchantman heard of her distress, & knowing that there was an Establishment of that kind here & help given he offered her a passage on board of his ship, as his voyage was one of Trade he stopped at many Ports, & she was 4 months on board during which he treated her with the greatest humanity and respect, & as she is above 50, one not need suppose the honest Captain had any other motives for his kindness.  He brought her to Falmouth.  Her reason likewise for Coming to England, I forgot at first to mention, was the recollection of having relations here …”

Volume 3.

Friday 21st June 1799

“…a bad night, I did not rise till 8; prayer, dressed & breakfasted soon, & then called upon Mrs Parish at Mrs Planto’s & went with her to her nephews JW & WP – Guildford Street to see the King review the Volunteers …. The King with all his family ,,, came to the Foundling Hospital opposite….”

The entry for January 4, 1792 contains a good critical passage on The Memoirs of Cardinal Richelieu.  The next day she writes of making further progress with Mackintosh’s Defence of the French Revolution – An answer to Burke, also “John read the Bible half an hour … and Mr Larpent read aloud two Acts of Corneille’s Cid.

A week later, on 12 January 1792 she remarks about two pieces of drama:

“Notoriety.  There is wit & laughter in the play but forced situations, and no knowledge of the world. – Blue Beard a poor flimsy pantomime.”

In The Feminist Companion to Literature in English ed.  Blain, Clements and Grundy (Batsford, 1990) Anna Margaretta Larpent is described as “A penetrating, outspoken theatre critic…”  The Diary is certainly very well laid out and easy to read and should be an excellent source for all researchers interested in this period.

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