Amy's Reading Room
In her diaries Amy mentioned and discussed a plethora of books. They range from books that were popular at the time to the untranslated versions of Dante’s Divine Comedies to religious texts. Reading seemed to be an important part of her younger life and would have influenced her later published works. Below is a non-exhaustive list of the books that she has written in her diaries, along with her perceived favourite authors.
Marie H. Adélaïde, Holland House (1874)
Dante Alighieri,
- Purgatorio (14th Century)
- Inferno (14th Century)
Angélique A. d'Andilly, Mémoires pour servir à l'histoire de Port Royal (1742)
Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice (1813)
Giambattista Bazzoni, Il Castello di Trezzo (1827)
Mother Beatrice, Legenda Monastica (1872)
William Black
- Princess of Thule (1873)
- The Maid of Killeena (1874)
Napoleon Bonaparte, History of Julius Caesar (1865)
Frederick Boyle, Chronicles of No-Man's Land (1880)
Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre (1847)
Francis C. Burnand, My Time, and What I've Done with It (1874)
Charles Butler, The Lives of Dom Armand Jean Le Bouthillier De Rance, and of Thomas à Kempis (1814)
Joseph Butler, The Analogy of Religion (1873)
George Byron, Parisina (1815)
Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote (1605-15)
William Chappell, The History of Music (1874)
Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales (c. 1400)
George T. Chesney, A True Reformer (1873)
A. Cleveland Coxe and John A. Hows, Christian Ballads (1865)
Dinah M. M. Craik, Christian's Mistake (1866)
Charles Dickens, Our Mutual Friend (1865)
Charles W. Dilke, The Fall of Prince Florestan of Monaco (1874)
Anna H. Drury, Misrepresenation: A Novel (1859)
Robert E. Dudgeon, Colymbia (1873)
Alexandre Dumas
- Les Trois Mousquetaires (1844)
- Vingt ans apres (1845)
- La Dame de Monsoreau (1846)
Frederick W. Faber, Sights and Thoughts in Foreign Churches and Among Foreign People (1842)
Millicent G. Fawcett, Tales in Political Economy (1874)
James A. Froude, The English in Ireland in the Eighteenth Century (1873)
Émile Gaboriau, Monsieur Lecoq (1868)
Elizabeth Gaskell, Wives and Daughters (1864-66)
Johann W. von Goethe, Faust (1832)
Carlo Goldoni, Scelte Commedie (1869)
Charles Greville, The Greville Memoirs (1874)
François P. G. Guizot
- Pourquoi la Révolution d'Angleterre a-t-elle reussi? (1850)
- Discours sur l'histoire, de la Révolution d'Angleterre (1850)
Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Blithedale Romance (1852)
Arthur Helps, Ivan de Biron (1874)
Bracebridge Hemyng, Butler Burke at Eton (1865)
Jeanie Hering, Through the Mist (1874)
Theordore Hook
- Gilbert Gurney (1835)
- Gurney Married (1838)
Victor Hugo
- The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1831)
- Les Travailleurs de la Mer (1866)
- Quatre Vingt Treize (1874)
David F. Jamison, The Life and Times of Bertrand Du Guesclin: A History of the Fourteenth (1864)
Henrietta Jenkins, Two French Marriages (1868)
Maria A. J. Johanna, Correspondence to Axel von Fersen (1877)
Thomas à Kempis, The Imitation of Christ (c. 1418)
William Keppel, Exodus of the Western Nations (1865)
Henry Kingsley
- The Hillyars and the Burtons (1865)
- Reginald Hetherege (1874)
Charles Kingsley, Hereward the Wake (1866)
Edward H. Knatchbull-Hugessen, Queer Folk (1874)
Charles R. Leslie and Tom Taylor, Life and Times of Sir Joshua Reynolds (1865)
Charles Lever
- Cornelius O'Dowd upon Men and Women and Other Things in General (1864)
- Tony Butler (1865)
Elizabeth L. Linton, The Life of Joshua Davidson (1882)
Guy Livingstone, Sans Merci (1866)
Henry E. Manning, Sermons (1842-50)
Florence Marryat
- Love's Conflict (1865)
- Woman Against Woman (1866)
Jean B. Mary-Lafon, Jaufry the Knight and the Fair Brunissende (1856)
Jean-Hippolyte Michon, Le Maudit (1864)
John S. Mill, Autobiography (1873)
Robert Milman, The Love of the Atonement (1888)
John Milton
- L'Allegro (1645)
- Paradise Lost (1667)
- Paradise Regained (1671)
- Samson Agonistes (1671)
William F. Milton and Walter B. Cheadle, The North-West Passage by Land (1865)
Charlotte Moscheles, Life of Moscheles (1873)
John L. Motley, Life and Death of John of BArneveld (1617)
Charles New, Life, Wandering, and Labours in Eastern Africa (1873)
John H. Newman, History of my Religious Opinions (1865)
Margaret Oliphant
- For Love and Life (1874)
- Innocent: A Tale of Modern Life (1874)
Harriet 'Holme Lee' Parr, The Wonderful Adventures of Tuflongbo and His Elfin Company (1861)
James Payn, Lost Sir Massingberd: A Romance of Real Life (1864)
Plutarch, The Life of Aemilius (1st Century)
Edgar Allan Poe, The Raven (1845)
Jean-Baptiste 'Molière' Poquelin
- Tartuffe (1664)
- Amphitryon (1668)
Edward B. Pusey, Doctrine of the Real Presence (1855)
Quatrelles, La Légende De Croque-mitaine (1863)
Ann Radcliffe, The Mysteries of Udolpho (1794)
William B. Rands, Henry Holbeach: Student in Life and Philosophy (1865)
Rudolf E. Raspe, Baron Munchausen's Narrative of his Marvellous Travels and Campaigns in Russia (1785)
Henry Reed, Lectures in English History and Tragic Poetry (1865)
Clara Reeve, The Old English Baron (1778)
Charlotte E. L. Riddell, Home, Sweet Home (1873)
Frederick W. Robinson, The House of Elmore (1855)
Michael F. Sadler, Christian Doctrine, Bible Truth (1891)
George Sand, Le Petite Fadette (1849)
Walter Scott
- Marmion (1808)
- The Lady of the Lake (1810)
- The Bridal of Triermain (1813)
- Waverley (1814)
William Shakespeare
- The Taming of the Shrew (c. 1590)
- The Merchant of Venice (c. 1596)
Mary Shelley, Frankenstein (1818)
Elizabeth S. Sheppard, Charles Auchester (1853)
Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queen (1590-96)
John A. Symonds, An Introduction to the Study of Dante (1899)
Alfred Tennyson
- In Memoriam A.H.H. (1850)
- The Holy Grail and Other Poems (1869)
- Pelleas and Ettare (1869)
- The Last Tournament (1871)
- Gareth and Lynette (1872)
George W. Thornbury, Criss-Cross Journeys (1873)
Tinsey Magazine's A Stable for Nightmares (1868)
Mark Twain, An American Tramp (1880)
Anthony Trollope
- La Vendée (1850)
- Framley Parsonage (1860)
- Can You Forgive Her? (1864)
- The Belton Estate (1865)
- Miss Mackenzie (1865)
- Lady Anna (1871)
- Phineas Redux (1873)
Ármin Vámbéry, Travels in Central Asia (1864)
Jules Verne
- From the Earth to the Moon (1865)
- Around the World in Eighty Days (1872)
Lucy B. Walford, Mr Smith: A Part of His Life (1875)
Horace Walpole, The Castle of Otranto (1764)
George L. Whyte-Melville, Uncle John (1874)
H. Wood, Johnny Ludlow (1895)
Thérèse 'Lady Avonmore' Yelverton, Teresina Peregrina (1874)
Charlotte M. Yonge, Heartsease (1897)
Louis Blanc, The History of Ten Years, (Révolution française: histoire de dix ans), (1830-1840)
Mary Elizabeth Branddon, Lady Audley's Secret (1862)
Other authors she enjoyed:
- Thomas Carlyle
- George Eliot
- Jane Eyre
Works she read (authors unknown):
- The Leisure Hour (periodical)
- Thorough Bass
- Good for Nothing
Disclaimer: This is non-exhaustive list, simply collated while doing other research and reading Amy's diaries.
by Rose Kearney, Eva Barker, Rachel Taylor, Jace Field and Rebecca Johnson.