Hester Lynch Thrale Piozzi (née Salusbury; later Piozzi; 27 January 1741 or 16 January 1740 – 2 May 1821),
[Contemporary records, which used the Julian calendar and the Annunciation Style of enumerating years, recorded her birth as 16 January 1740. The provisions of the British ]Calendar (New Style) Act 1750
The Calendar (New Style) Act 1750 (24 Geo. II c.23), also known as Chesterfield's Act or (in American usage) the British Calendar Act of 1751, is an Act of the Parliament of Great Britain. Its purpose was for Great Britain and t ...
, implemented in 1752, altered the official British dating method to the Gregorian calendar with the start of the year on 1 January (it had been 25 March). These changes resulted in dates being moved forward 11 days, and for those between 1 January and 25 March, an advance of one year. For further explanation, see: Old Style and New Style dates
Old Style (O.S.) and New Style (N.S.) indicate dating systems before and after a calendar change, respectively. Usually, this is the change from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar as enacted in various European countries between 1 ...
. a Welsh-born
diarist
A diary is a written or audiovisual record with discrete entries arranged by date reporting on what has happened over the course of a day or other period. Diaries have traditionally been handwritten but are now also often digital. A person ...
, author and
patron of the arts
Patronage is the support, encouragement, privilege, or financial aid that an organization or individual bestows on another. In the history of art, arts patronage refers to the support that kings, popes, and the wealthy have provided to artists su ...
, is an important source on
Samuel Johnson
Samuel Johnson (18 September 1709 – 13 December 1784), often called Dr Johnson, was an English writer who made lasting contributions as a poet, playwright, essayist, moralist, critic, biographer, editor and lexicographer. The ''Oxford D ...
and 18th-century English life. She belonged to the prominent
Salusbury family, Anglo-Welsh landowners, and married first a wealthy brewer,
Henry Thrale, then a music teacher, Gabriel Mario Piozzi. Her ''
Anecdotes of the Late Samuel Johnson'' (1786) and her diary ''
Thraliana'', published posthumously in 1942, are the main works for which she is remembered. She also wrote a
popular history book and a
dictionary
A dictionary is a listing of lexemes from the lexicon of one or more specific languages, often arranged alphabetically (or by radical and stroke for ideographic languages), which may include information on definitions, usage, etymologies, ...
. She has been seen as a
protofeminist.
Early years
Hester Lynch Salusbury was born at Bodvel Hall,
Caernarvonshire
, HQ= County Hall, Caernarfon
, Map=
, Image= Flag
, Motto= Cadernid Gwynedd (The strength of Gwynedd)
, year_start=
, Arms= ''Coat of arms of Caerna ...
, Wales, the only daughter of Hester Lynch Cotton and
Sir John Salusbury. As a member of the powerful
Salusbury family, she belonged to one of the most illustrious Welsh land-owning dynasties of the
Georgian era
The Georgian era was a period in British history from 1714 to , named after the Hanoverian Kings George I, George II, George III and George IV. The definition of the Georgian era is often extended to include the relatively short reign of Will ...
. Through her father's line, she was a direct descendant of
Katheryn of Berain.
Hester enjoyed the devoted attention of her uncles and was educated to a high level for a young woman. She would later describe that "they had taught me to read and speak and think and translate from the French, till I was half a prodigy."
Career
First marriage
After her father had gone bankrupt in an attempt to invest in
Halifax, Nova Scotia
Halifax is the capital and largest municipality of the Canadian province of Nova Scotia, and the largest municipality in Atlantic Canada. As of the 2021 Census, the municipal population was 439,819, with 348,634 people in its urban area. The ...
, Hester married the rich brewer
Henry Thrale on 11 October 1763, at
St Anne's Chapel, Soho, London. They had twelve children and lived at
Streatham Park
Streatham Park is an area of suburban South West London that comprises the eastern part of Furzedown ward in the London Borough of Wandsworth, formerly in the historic parish of Streatham. It is bounded by Tooting Bec Common to the north, T ...
. However, the marriage was often strained: her husband frequently felt slighted by members of the court and may well have married to improve his social status. The Thrales' eldest daughter,
Hester, became a viscountess as the wife of
George Elphinstone, 1st Viscount Keith
George Keith Elphinstone, 1st Viscount Keith (7 January 1746 – 10 March 1823), was a British naval officer active throughout the Napoleonic Wars.
Career Early service
George Elphinstone was the fourth son of Charles Elphinstone, 10th ...
.
After her marriage, Thrale was free to associate with whom she pleased. Due to her husband's financial status, she was able to enter London society, as a result of which she met
Samuel Johnson
Samuel Johnson (18 September 1709 – 13 December 1784), often called Dr Johnson, was an English writer who made lasting contributions as a poet, playwright, essayist, moralist, critic, biographer, editor and lexicographer. The ''Oxford D ...
,
James Boswell
James Boswell, 9th Laird of Auchinleck (; 29 October 1740 ( N.S.) – 19 May 1795), was a Scottish biographer, diarist, and lawyer, born in Edinburgh. He is best known for his biography of his friend and older contemporary the English writer S ...
, Bishop
Thomas Percy,
Oliver Goldsmith
Oliver Goldsmith (10 November 1728 – 4 April 1774) was an Anglo-Irish novelist, playwright, dramatist and poet, who is best known for his novel '' The Vicar of Wakefield'' (1766), his pastoral poem ''The Deserted Village'' (1770), and his p ...
, and other literary figures, including the young
Frances Burney
Frances Burney (13 June 1752 – 6 January 1840), also known as Fanny Burney and later Madame d'Arblay, was an English satirical novelist, diarist and playwright. In 1786–1790 she held the post as "Keeper of the Robes" to Charlotte of Mecklen ...
, whom she took with her to
Gay Street,
Bath
Bath may refer to:
* Bathing, immersion in a fluid
** Bathtub, a large open container for water, in which a person may wash their body
** Public bathing, a public place where people bathe
* Thermae, ancient Roman public bathing facilities
Pla ...
.
In July 1774 Johnson visited Wales in Thrale's company, during which time they visited Hester's uncle
Sir Lynch Cotton at
Combermere in Denbighshire. Frances, the wife of Sir Lynch's son
Robert
The name Robert is an ancient Germanic given name, from Proto-Germanic "fame" and "bright" (''Hrōþiberhtaz''). Compare Old Dutch ''Robrecht'' and Old High German ''Hrodebert'' (a compound of '' Hruod'' ( non, Hróðr) "fame, glory, honou ...
"found Johnson, despite his rudeness, at times delightful, having a manner peculiar to himself in relating anecdotes that could not fail to attract old and young. Her impression was that Thrale was very vexatious in wishing to engross all his attention, which annoyed him much."
Johnson wrote two verses for Thrale in 1775, the first to celebrate her 35th birthday, and another in Latin to honour her.
Frances Burney, in her diary, describes the conversations at several of Thrale's soirées, including one in 1779 about a young woman named Miss Sophy Streatfeild (1755–1835), who was a favourite of Mr Johnson and Mr Thrale, rather to the chagrin of Hester, who commented that Sophy "had a power of captivation that was irresistible... her beauty joined to her softness, her caressing manners, her tearful eyes, and alluring looks, would insinuate her into the heart of any man she thought worth attacking." The touch of understandable spite here revealed in Thrale's nature is tempered by her wry humour in remarking (after another of her male guests had professed devotion to Sophy and the desire to "soothe" her): "I would ensure her power of crying herself into any of your hearts she pleased. I made her cry to Miss Burney, to show how beautiful she looked in tears" and (on being rebuked about this) "Oh but she liked it... Miss Burney would have run away but she came forward on purpose to show herself. Sophy Streatfeild is never happier than when tears trickle down from her fine eyes in company."
The Thrales were in Bath in 1780 at the time of the
Gordon Riots
The Gordon Riots of 1780 were several days of rioting in London motivated by anti-Catholic sentiment. They began with a large and orderly protest against the Papists Act 1778, which was intended to reduce official discrimination against British ...
, when a Roman Catholic chapel was set on fire, although the greater worry was whether Thrale's brewery in
Southwark
Southwark ( ) is a district of Central London situated on the south bank of the River Thames, forming the north-western part of the wider modern London Borough of Southwark. The district, which is the oldest part of South London, developed ...
would escape being ransacked, which it narrowly did.
Burney records Thrale's distress on losing her husband (4 April 1781), referring to her as "sweet Mrs. Thrale" and sympathising with the "agitation" she was under in having to sell the brewery and wind up his affairs. Burney was there to congratulate and cheer Thrale when the business was concluded.
Second marriage
During the ensuing years, Thrale fell in love with Gabriel Mario Piozzi, an Italian music teacher who had taught the Thrale's children, and married him on 25 July 1784. She complained: "I see the English newspapers are full of gross Insolence towards me," with one commenting how Thrale could not have imagined "his wife's disgrace, by eventually raising an obscure and penniless Fiddler into sudden Wealth." This caused a rift with Johnson, which was only perfunctorily mended shortly before his death. The levelling marriage also earned her the disapproval of Burney (who would herself marry in 1793 the impoverished, Catholic émigré Alexandre D'Arblay) and her cousins the
Cottons. With her second husband, Hester retired to
Brynbella, a specially built
country house
An English country house is a large house or mansion in the English countryside. Such houses were often owned by individuals who also owned a town house. This allowed them to spend time in the country and in the city—hence, for these peopl ...
on her Bach y Graig estate in the
Vale of Clwyd
The Vale of Clwyd ( cy, Dyffryn Clwyd) is a tract of low-lying ground in the county of Denbighshire in north-east Wales. The Vale extends south-southwestwards from the coast of the Irish Sea for some 20 miles (about 30 km) forming a triangl ...
, near
Tremeirchion in north Wales in 1795.
Written works
After Johnson's death, she published ''
Anecdotes of the Late Samuel Johnson'' (1786) and their letters to each other (1788).
[Michael J. Franklin, "Piozzi , Hester Lynch (1741–1821)", ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'' (Oxford, UK: OUP, 2004]
Retrieved 25 April 2017.
/ref> Frances Burney, who considered both Johnson and Thrale to be among her dearest friends, read the unpublished manuscript with much interest, but disapproved of the decision to publish, noting, "She has given all – every word – and thinks that, perhaps, a justice to Dr Johnson, which, in fact, is the greatest injury to his memory." Together with Thrale's diaries, which were known as '' Thraliana'' and not published until 1942, these sources help to fill out the biased picture of Johnson often presented in James Boswell
James Boswell, 9th Laird of Auchinleck (; 29 October 1740 ( N.S.) – 19 May 1795), was a Scottish biographer, diarist, and lawyer, born in Edinburgh. He is best known for his biography of his friend and older contemporary the English writer S ...
's ''Life of Samuel Johnson
Life is a quality that distinguishes matter that has biological processes, such as signaling and self-sustaining processes, from that which does not, and is defined by the capacity for growth, reaction to stimuli, metabolism, energy tra ...
''. Johnson often stayed with the Thrale household and had his own room above the library at Streatham, in which he worked. The friendship between Johnson and Thrale was emotionally intimate, and after John Thrale died in 1781 "Johnson's circle took it for granted that he would marry Hester." Based upon two letters Johnson wrote to Thrale in French and a passage in Thrale's ''Anecdotes of the Late Samuel Johnson,'' Thrale's biographer Ian McIntyre and Johnson's biographers Peter Martin and Jeffrey Meyers have suggested that Thrale and Johnson had a sadomasochistic relationship in which Thrale whipped Johnson.
Her ''Retrospection...'' (1801) was an attempt at a popular history of that period, but was not received well by critics, some of whom patently resented female intrusion into what was then the male preserve of history. Reviewers also coupled sexism with ageism in dismissing her work. One reviewer called it "a series of dreams by an old lady." Posterity has been kinder. According to the ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', "it has since been seen as a feminist history, concerned to show changes in manners and mores in so far as they affected women; it has also been judged to anticipate Marxian history in its keen apprehension of reification: 'machines imitated mortals to unhoped perfection, and men found out they were themselves machines.'"
A lexicographer
Lexicography is the study of lexicons, and is divided into two separate academic disciplines. It is the art of compiling dictionaries.
* Practical lexicography is the art or craft of compiling, writing and editing dictionaries.
* Theoretica ...
in her own right, Mrs Piozzi's ''British synonymy, or, An attempt at regulating the choice of words in familiar conversation'' was published in 1794 by G. G. & J. Robinson of London, ten years after Dr Johnson's death.
Death and legacy
Hester Piozzi died at No. 10 (now 20) Sion Row, Clifton, Bristol, of complications after a fall, and was buried on 16 May 1821 near Brynbella in the churchyard of Corpus Christi Church, Tremeirchion, next to Piozzi. A marble plaque inside the church was erected in 1909:
Near this place are interred the remains of
Hester Lynch Piozzi.
"Doctor Johnson's Mrs Thrale"
Born 1741. Died 1821.
Witty. Vivacious and Charming. In an Age of Genius
She Ever Held a Foremost Place
This Tablet is Erected by Orlando Butler Fellowes
Grand-Son of Sir James Fellowes. The Intimate Friend of
Mrs. Piozzi and her Executor.
Assisted by Subscriptions
28th April 1909.
Frances Burney eulogised her, going so far as to make a comparison with Germaine de Staël
Anne Louise Germaine de Staël-Holstein (; ; 22 April 176614 July 1817), commonly known as Madame de Staël (), was a French woman of letters and political theorist, the daughter of banker and French finance minister Jacques Necker and Suza ...
.[''The Journals and Letters of Fanny Burney (Madame D'Arblay'', ed. Joyce Hemlow et al., 12 vols (London: OUP, 1972–1984), IX, pp. 208–209.]
From the time of her death almost up to the present, she was referred to by scholars as Johnson had done, as Mrs Thrale or Hester Thrale. Nowadays she is often referred to as Hester Lynch Piozzi or Mrs Piozzi.
Samuel Beckett
Samuel Barclay Beckett (; 13 April 1906 – 22 December 1989) was an Irish novelist, dramatist, short story writer, theatre director, poet, and literary translator. His literary and theatrical work features bleak, impersonal and tragicomic exp ...
drew on Thrale's diaries and ''Anecdotes
An anecdote is "a story with a point", such as to communicate an abstract idea about a person, place, or thing through the concrete details of a short narrative or to characterize by delineating a specific quirk or trait. Occasionally humorous, ...
'' to dramatize her and Johnson's relationship in one of his earliest plays, '' Human Wishes''. However, he abandoned the play after completing the first act.
Author Lillian de la Torre featured Thrale in the story "The Stolen Christmas Box", part of a series featuring Johnson as a detective.
A three-act opera, ''Johnson Preserv'd'', was written by the English composer Richard Stoker, with a libretto by Jill Watt. The characters are Dr Samuel Johnson, James Boswell, Hester Thrale, Gabriel Piozzi, and Mrs Thrale's maid Polly (the only fictitious character). The opera was performed by Opera Piccola at St Pancras Town Hall
Camden Town Hall, known as St Pancras Town Hall until 1965, is the headquarters of Camden London Borough Council. The main entrance is in Judd street with its northern elevation extending along Euston Road, opposite the main front of St Pancras ...
, London, in July 1967, with the tenor Philip Langridge
Philip Gordon Langridge (16 December 1939 – 5 March 2010)Millington (7 March 2010) was an English tenor, considered to be among the foremost exponents of English opera and oratorio.
Early life
Langridge was born in Hawkhurst, Kent, edu ...
performing the role of Piozzi. It was conducted by Vilem Tausky and directed by Anthony Sharp
Dennis Anthony John Sharp (16 June 1915 – 23 July 1984) was an English actor, writer and director.
Stage career
Anthony Sharp was a graduate of the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art ( LAMDA) and made his stage debut in February 1938 ...
. The vocal score was published by Peters Edition in 1971.
See also
* Salusbury Family
* John Salusbury Piozzi Salusbury – adopted son
* Lleweni Hall
Further reading
*Beryl Bainbridge
Dame Beryl Margaret Bainbridge (21 November 1932 – 2 July 2010) was an English writer from Liverpool. She was primarily known for her works of psychological fiction, often macabre tales set among the English working class. Bainbridge won the ...
, '' According to Queeney'', Little Brown & Co., 2001 (novel)
*
*
*Marianna D'Ezio, "The Advantages of Demi-Naturalization": Hester Piozzi's "Observations and Reflections Made in the Course of a Journey Through France, Italy and Germany" (1789), ''Journal for Eighteenth Century Studies'' 33:2 (2010), pp. 165–180
*Marianna D'Ezio, ''Hester Lynch Thrale Piozzi. A Taste for Eccentricity''. Newcastle upon Tyne. Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2010
*
*
*H. L. Piozzi, E. A. Bloom and L. D. Bloom, ''The Piozzi letters: Correspondence of Hester Lynch Piozzi, 1784-1821 (formerly Mrs. Thrale)''. Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1989
* C. E. Vulliamy, ''Mrs. Thrale of Streatham''. London: Cape, 1936
*
References
Notes
Bibliography
*
*
*
*
*Francine Prose, ''The Lives of the Muses''. New York: Harper Collins, 2002, pp. 29–56.
External links
*
*
*
*
*
Grand Ball in celebration of her 80th birthday
*
Thrale Piozzi Manuscripts
John Rylands Library
The John Rylands Research Institute and Library is a late-Victorian neo-Gothic building on Deansgate in Manchester, England. It is part of the University of Manchester. The library, which opened to the public in 1900, was founded by Enriquet ...
, University of Manchester
, mottoeng = Knowledge, Wisdom, Humanity
, established = 2004 – University of Manchester Predecessor institutions: 1956 – UMIST (as university college; university 1994) 1904 – Victoria University of Manchester 1880 – Victoria Unive ...
Dr. Johnson and Mrs. Thrale by Adam Gopnick
*
Hester Lynch Piozzi
at th
Eighteenth-Century Poetry Archive (ECPA)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Thrale, Hester Lynch
1741 births
1821 deaths
18th-century lexicographers
18th-century Welsh women writers
19th-century Welsh women writers
18th-century Welsh writers
19th-century Welsh historians
British salon-holders
Samuel Johnson
Streathamites
Hester
Tremeirchion
People from Caernarfonshire
Deaths from falls
Welsh diarists
Women diarists
British patrons of the arts
Welsh women historians
Welsh lexicographers
Women lexicographers