Writing on the eve of her 50th birthday, Elizabeth Montagu observed that while in her youth she "should not have liked to have been classed among authors," now this title was by no means a shameful one for any woman to hold. Mrs Montagu was well-placed to know the merits of authorship; wealthy and well-connected (her husband, after all, was a grandson of the Earl of Sandwich), she viewed the publication of her work, most notably the 1769 Essay on the Writings and Genius of Shakespeare, as offering potential enhancement to an already established place in society.
She could, therefore, afford to be both a writer and a patron of other writers, but this was by no means a widely-enjoyed advantage. Dr Johnson, for example, who occupies a central but discreet position in Norma Clarke's study of 18th-century female authors, was constantly short of funds. In 1756 he told an admirer that the inducement for every literary task undertaken "is not love or desire of fame, but the want of money, which is the only motive to writing that I know of." How many authors today might acknowledge the truth of this remark, and yet how much easier is the contemporary writer's lot than was the case 250 years ago.
As Mrs Montagu noted, the position of women who aspired to see their writings in print was especially difficult, which is why so many of these authors continued well into the 19th century to have their work published anonymously. Sometimes this approach might be no more than a gossamer veil, since the identity of a writer such as Elizabeth Carter would be generally known, and acknowledged, at least within London's literary circles. But Miss Carter was a woman of exceptional academic brilliance - Dr Johnson reckoned her possibly the best Greek scholar in the land - and her most important work was a translation into English of all extant texts by the Stoic philosopher Epictetus. Published as a handsome volume in 1758, this sold so well that its author was able to buy a large house for herself on the Kentish coast from where she would embark on long walks while pondering matters of an intellectual character.
It is noteworthy how many of the women who bravely undertook to risk social opprobrium - and worse - in their pursuit of a literary career also opted to remain single. Mrs Montagu and Mrs Thrale were exceptions to this rule, of course, both enabled by their respective husbands' money to embark on authorship for the pleasure it gave them instead of being driven by financial necessity. The particular problems encountered by women in pursuit of an income derived from writing are wonderfully delineated by Clarke in her description of Hannah More's attempt at patronage in 1784.
More, who had deployed her literary abilities to overcome relatively modest origins in Bristol, "discovered" that the woman who delivered milk every day to her house, Ann Yearsley, possessed certain talents as a poet. It was therefore decided that Yearsley, renamed "Lactilla" in her guise as an author, should be given monetary aid and the chance of publication.
Regretfully, the object of More's charity proved to be less than grateful, especially when she discovered that funds raised on her behalf had been placed in an account to which she was denied access. Ugly scenes followed, with More, who had been jettisoned by her fiancΘ some years earlier, denounced by Yearsley (married, with six young children) as a "slighted prude" until eventually the money was handed over.
The story of Hannah More and Ann Yearsley is just one of many told by Clarke in a book which, from its opening paragraphs, exudes informative entertainment. Here is one of those rare exercises in literary history which not only manages to exhume largely forgotten authors but also present them to a new generation of readers in the most enchanting manner. The outcome is a hunger to re-read the original texts, if not perhaps the oeuvre of Epictetus rendered into Miss Carter's inestimable English, then undoubtedly Charlotte Lennox's entertaining The Female Quixote of 1752.
Dr Johnson was not in favour of lavish praise; a story circulated in London that he had once rebuked Hannah More, "Dearest lady, consider with yourself what your flattery is worth, before you bestow it so freely." In the case of Dr Johnson's Women, however, fulsome congratulations to the author are fully deserved as she demonstrates that the efforts of her 18th century precursors were certainly not in vain.
Robert O'Byrne is an Irish Times journalist and author