author of “ Izaak Walton and his Friends ,” etc. “As long as the names of Garrick, of Johnson, and of Seward shall endure, Lichfield will live renowned.”— Clarke . “Biography, the most interesting perhaps of every species of composition, loses all its interest with me when the shades and lights of the principal characters are not accurately and faithfully detailed.” Extract from a letter of Sir Walter Scott to Anna Seward . Worcester: printed by deighton and co. , high street . 1909....

Literature and music and science have been found this year amazingly prolific in centenary commemorations of their great exemplars, as a leading article in the “Times,” for April, 1909, has lately reminded us.  Yet the death in 1809 of Anna Seward, who “for many years held a high rank in the annals of British literature,” to quote the words of Sir Walter Scott, has generally passed unnoticed.  It is the aim of this book to resuscitate interest in the poetess, and in the literary circle over whic

Anna Seward, a daughter of the Rev. Thomas Seward, destined to become, by universal assent, the first poetess of her day in England, was born 12th December, 1747.  Her mother was Elizabeth, one of the three daughters of the Rev. John Hunter (who was in 1704 appointed Head Master of Lichfield Grammar School), by his first wife, Miss Norton, a daughter of Edward Norton, of Warwick, and sister of the Rev. Thomas Norton, of Warwick.  Anna Seward’s parents were married at Newton Regis Church, Warwick