Reading Order
A Simple Story Reading Order
A Simple Story (1791) by Elizabeth Inchbald is one of the most compelling and formally unusual novels of the eighteenth century — a novel in two halves, written decades apart, that tells the story of a young Catholic woman (Miss Milner) and her guardian (Dorriforth, a Catholic priest who is later released from his vows to become Lord Elmwood), and then the story of their daughter Matilda a generation later. The first half is a novel of passion and will — Miss Milner is brilliant, self-willed, and in love with her guardian; Dorriforth is principled, authoritarian, and resistant; their relationship is one of the most psychologically acute in the eighteenth-century novel, and it ends in disaster. The second half is a novel of suffering and redemption — Matilda, the daughter, lives under her father's absolute prohibition against seeing her (he has expunged the mother's existence from his life after her adultery) and the slow, painful restoration of the father-daughter relationship. The two halves are formally and tonally very different, and the gap between them is part of Inchbald's argument about what passion destroys and what it leaves behind. Maria Edgeworth admired it extravagantly; Jane Austen knew it; and it was rediscovered in the twentieth century as a key text in the study of women's fiction and the literature of sensibility and authority.
Where to start
A Simple Story (1791) — the Oxford World's Classics edition edited by J.M.S. Tompkins with an introduction by Jane Spencer (1988; 2009) is the standard scholarly edition and has the best introduction to the novel's composition history (written in two widely separated periods) and its formal structure. The novel is not long by eighteenth-century standards; the two halves can be read in separate sittings, which emphasizes their tonal difference.
Complete A Simple Story Book List
- 1Buy
A Simple Story (Oxford World's Classics)
Elizabeth Inchbald (ed. J.M.S. Tompkins, intro. Jane Spencer)·2009·The standard scholarly edition — Spencer's introduction is the best guide to the novel's compositional history, its treatment of authority and sensibility, and its place in the tradition of women's fiction; Tompkins's original edition restored a neglected classic to view. - 2Buy
Nature and Art
Elizabeth Inchbald·1796·Inchbald's second and final novel — a more political allegory about civilization and natural virtue; less psychologically complex than A Simple Story but important for understanding Inchbald's full range and the radical context of her fiction. - 3Buy
The British Theatre (25 vols.)
Elizabeth Inchbald (ed.)·1806·Inchbald's major editorial project — she edited and prefaced twenty-five volumes of British plays; her prefaces are some of the best short dramatic criticism of the period and reveal a mind as capable in critical as in creative writing. - 4Buy
Mansfield Park
Jane Austen·1814·The Austen novel most deeply influenced by A Simple Story — the passive, suffering heroine (Fanny Price), the powerful, authoritarian guardian-figure (Sir Thomas Bertram), and the complex of authority and sensibility are all present; reading Inchbald alongside Austen reveals Mansfield Park's literary sources. - 5Buy
Elizabeth Inchbald: A Biographical Study
Roger Manvell·1987·The standard biography — Manvell traces Inchbald's remarkable career as actress, playwright, novelist, and editor; essential for understanding how A Simple Story was composed over two decades of theatrical life.
A Simple Story — Frequently Asked Questions
What is A Simple Story by Elizabeth Inchbald about?
A Simple Story (1791) by Elizabeth Inchbald is structured in two halves. The first follows Miss Milner, a brilliant, self-willed young Catholic woman, and her guardian Dorriforth, a Catholic priest who later becomes Lord Elmwood — their psychologically acute relationship of desire and resistance ends in disaster. The second half, set a generation later, follows their daughter Matilda, who lives under her father's absolute prohibition against seeing her (he has expunged her mother's memory after her adultery) and the slow, painful restoration of the father-daughter relationship. The two halves are formally very different and together constitute an argument about what passion destroys and what can be rebuilt.
Why is A Simple Story unusual among eighteenth-century novels?
A Simple Story (1791) is unusual for three reasons. First, its two-part structure — written decades apart, in very different modes (passion and comedy in Part I; suffering and redemption in Part II) — is unlike any other major eighteenth-century novel; the gap between the parts is part of the book's argument. Second, its heroine Miss Milner is one of the most self-willed, intellectually compelling women in the eighteenth-century novel — she is not virtuous in any conventional sense, and the novel treats her brilliance and her passion with equal respect. Third, its treatment of Catholic identity (both Miss Milner and Dorriforth are Catholic, and religious law shapes the plot's central conflict) is more direct and sustained than in any other major novel of the period.
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