Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
Mary Wortley Montagu ( born May 26, 1689 London, † August 21, 1762 ibid ) was an English writer who became famous through her letters and poems.
Life
She was the daughter of Evelyn Pierrepont, later Duke of Kingston upon Hull. Her mother was the daughter of William Feilding, 1st Earl of Denbigh. She had two sisters and a brother. Mary was a typical for their state education, but probably also benefited from the lessons of her brother. She was friends with a number of famous people, such as Mary Astell, which advocated for women's rights.
1712 she married Edward Wortley Montagu, the brother of a pen pal, against the orders of her father. The first years of marriage were marked by financial difficulties. When her husband but in 1715 a member of parliament and shortly afterwards Chancellor of the Exchequer was, they moved to London gutsituiert. In 1713, her son Edward was ( 1713-1776 ) to the world.
The position of her husband, she often stayed at the British court, and made the acquaintance with the writer Alexander Pope, who greatly admired and with whom she kept letter Contact for many years, even after the family in Turkey (then the Ottoman Empire) moved.
Her husband was sent early in 1716 as ambassador to the Ottoman court in Istanbul. In contrast to the women of her time, she accompanied him there. In Istanbul also their daughter Mary was born. But her husband made in 1717 was recalled again, the family still remained to 1718 in Turkey. From this period dates a series of letters, report on their trip and the observations which she made as a woman in an Islamic country.
In Turkey, she witnessed of smallpox vaccinations and let vaccinate their children there. Back in Europe, she reported hereof, however, met only with incomprehension and bias in the medical profession. Their biggest win of the thing was that King George I - albeit after testing on orphans and criminals - let vaccinate his grandson Jan Ingenhousz. From this point on, the vaccine used in the UK. However, it remained controversial until the doctor Edward Jenner in 1796 developed a reliable method.
On her return to London she quickly became the social center, but also implicated in a scandal. Her former friend Alexander Pope turned away from her; as a reason to suspect that Lady Montagu would not give his advances. The friendship broke, and it was followed by a bitter feud, which was publicly held.
1739 she moved to the Continent, where they first settled in 1742 in Avignon, and four years later in Brescia. 1758 she moved to Venice. During this time she has completed an extensive correspondence with her daughter and old acquaintances in England. After the death of her husband in 1761, she returned to her home. Beginning in 1762 it reached England, but died in August of the same year.
Her granddaughter was the British writer Lady Louisa Stuart ( 1757-1851 ).
Works
First editions
Werkausgaben
- The Complete Letters of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. Edited by Robert Halsband. 3 vols Oxford 1965
- The Letters and Works of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. Edited by Lord Wharncliffe. 3 vols R. Bentley, London, 1837. Vol 1 Vol 2 Vol 3
Translations
- Letters from the Orient. Edited by Irmela grains, Promedia, Vienna 2006, ISBN 978-3-85371-259-7
- Letters from Vienna. Schendl Verlag, Wien, 1985, ISBN 3-85268-088-3
- Recent letters of Lady Mary Worthley Montague to various of her friends: An addendum to the owners of the first three parts of the letters collection of Lady Montague. Translated by John Balbach. Weigel and Schneider, Nuremberg 1786
- Letters of Lady Mary Worthley Montague: written during her travels in Europe, Asia and Africa, to persons from the state, scholars, etc. written in different parts of Europe; which besides other oddities include messages from the state administration and the customs of the Turks; drawn from sources that have been inaccessible to other travelers. 3 vols Weidmann's heirs and Reich, Leipzig 1763