Elizabeth Inchbald's A Simple Story

[RegLit]

It's been a few years since I read this book. Elizabeth Inchbald lived, wrote, and acted during the Regency era. When I read her background, it had meant very little to me at the time. Later, however, when I read Regency romances, especially those by Georgette Heyer, certain theatrical names were thrown out. The famous Mrs. Siddons and Kemble were close friends of Inchbald and she acted with them. She was well-known at the time as a playwright, though she did write two novels. A Simple Story was one of them. Unlike Austen, her novel was more somber. There was romance (two in fact), drama, tragedy, political and religious factions. It was a good book and would be of interest to students of this era. There seems to have been a revival in interest in her writings. It is unfortunate that she destroyed her autobiography just before she died, at the advice of her confessor. It might have given an insight to the life and times of late eighteenth, early nineteenth century. She came from a Catholic family and they must have had issues with her stage career. After all, it was not an age where actors and actresses were looked upon benevolently.