Lot 118: DELANY, MARY.

'MARIANNA',

a fair copy in a single hand, with a title page reading "Marianna. 1759" underneath which has been added, in the hand of queen charlotte, "Written by M^rs Delany.", paginated, red ruled margins, 75 pages plus blanks, 4to, c.1780, in half red morocco over marbled boards, gilt edges, boards slightly stained

LITERATURE

The Autobiography and Correspondence of Mary Granville, Mrs Delany, ed. Lady Llanover, 6 vols (1861-2); Ruth Hayden, Mrs Delany: Her Life and Flowers (1980)

NOTE

a fine manuscript, previously unrecorded and once the property of queen charlotte, of an apparently unpublished story by the artist, court favourite, and prolific correspondent, mary delany.

The story traces the development of a woman, Marianna, from childhood to adulthood and marriage. It is a conventional romance narrative which provides many insights into Delany's thoughts on children's development. The narrative is centred on two ruptures in the family unit. In the first, the young Marianna crosses a stile against the command of her parents and is then kidnapped by gypsies. In the second episode, the underlying subject of which is emergent sexuality, a thirteen year-old Marianna is chased by a "frightfull Bull" into a dark and threatening forest, where she is found in a cave by a group of sailors: "She lay like a poor distressed hare, panting with fear, not daring to move, but at last she heard one of the Men say to the other; A Prize, a Prize! & immediately found herself seized in a very ruffianly manner..." The events that follow lead eventually to Marianna's meeting with her future husband. So, whilst obedience to parental authority is a central theme of the story, the occasions when the child passes beyond parental control are shown by Delany to be crucial to her development to adulthood.

The story is set among the upper classes of Georgian England, and Delany's detailed description of the grand country houses and castles inhabited by her characters are another point of interest. She provides careful descriptions of gardens, galleries, parlours, and libraries; rooms furnished with musical instruments, prints, books, and "Cabinets, & glass-Cases, filled with natural & artificial curiosities".

Delany wrote this story in 1759, apparently for herself and her sister Anne (Llanover, vol. 3, p.580). For the character of Marianna herself, she presumably had Anne's thirteen year-old daughter Mary in mind. The manuscript known to Llanover is now at the Lilly Library in Indiana. The present manuscript was almost certainly produced later, in the 1770s or 80s, when Mary Delany was a close personal friend of the royal family; an appropriate gift for a Queen who was also the mother of girls entering adolescence. It is, therefore, not only remarkable as an unpublished story, but also as an intimate gift within the royal circle. For letters and other literary works by Mrs Delany, see lot 111.