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Apphia Peach, George Lord Lyttelton, and 'The Correspondents'
An Annotated Edition of a Forgotten Gem (1775)
By Melvyn New
This book is an annotated edition of The Correspondents (1775), a work, as the introduction argues, derived from A Sentimental Journey, and one of the best of the many later efforts to capture Sterne’s unique blend of sensibility and sensuality.
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About This Book
This book is an annotated edition of The Correspondents: An Original Novel (1775), a work, as the introduction argues, derived from A Sentimental Journey, and one of the best of the many later efforts to capture Sterne’s unique blend of sensibility and sensuality. The introduction will make the case for its authorship being an actual exchange of love letters between George Lord Lyttelton (1709–1773) and Apphia Peach Lyttelton (1743–1840), his daughter-in-law, 30 years younger than her father-in-law at the time of the exchange. In our inability to understand precisely what happened between the two is the genius of their imitation of Sterne. It is an ambiguity that results from the conscious reshaping of original letters into a narrative, probably by Apphia Peach in the 2 years between Lyttelton’s death and its publication. The correspondents exchange some 80 letters in all, many with references and quotations to writers in the literary tradition; these allusions will be annotated when at all possible. Particularly important are the allusions to Sterne’s Sentimental Journey, which was the origin of the design of The Correspondents, and to Shakespeare, Apphia Peach joining Lyttelton’s good friend Elizabeth Montagu in this early indication that the eighteenth-century elevation of Shakespeare was often the direct result of his women readers.
Reviews
“The Correspondents is, indeed, a ‘forgotten gem’—one of the many imitations, arguably the best, of Laurence Sterne and of the kind of sensibility he modeled for contemporaries. Convincingly attributing the work to poet and MP George, Lord Lyttelton, and his daughter-in-law Apphia Peach, Melvyn New presents an intriguing addition to the canon of eighteenth-century literature. Peach, in particular, is an epistolary revelation, and New’s contextualization of the text both situates her fully in her time and argues for her lasting significance.” — Elizabeth Kraft, Professor Emerita of English, University of Georgia
“There are several reasons to read this carefully edited novel: (1) the letters comprising it conjure three sensibilities—the two correspondents’ and Laurence Sterne’s; (2) the Lyttelton of these pages is the Bluestocking Lyttelton, whose preferred soulmates were gifted women; (3) the novel lavishly celebrates male/female ‘intercourse.’” — Deborah Heller, Professor of English, Western New Mexico University, Author of Bluestockings Now!: The Evolution of a Social Role (2015)
“Melvyn New, distinguished editor of Sterne and Richardson, rescues this almost forgotten work by the sickly Lord George Lyttelton, whose love letters to a woman 34 years younger and just returned from India bear a remarkable symmetry to the consumptive parson opening his heart to Eliza Draper, yet another 30 something off to the same colonial territory. With an abundance of documentation New argues persuasively that Lyttelton modeled his epistolary version of unfulfilled desire while confronting death on Sterne.” — John A. Dussinger, Professor Emeritus, University of Illinois
“The first scholarly edition of a forgotten major literary work, inspired by Laurence Sterne and brilliantly introduced by the leading American Sterne scholar.” —Peter de Voogd, Founding editor of The Shandean
Author Information
Melvyn New, Emeritus Professor of English, University of Florida, has been publishing on eighteenth-century literature since 1969. He was the editor of the University of Florida Works of Laurence Sterne in nine volumes, 1978–2014.
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Table of Contents
Works Frequently Cited; Introduction; Textual Note; The Correspondents; Annotations to The Correspondents; Appendices; Index
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