I’ve just discovered that the Chawton online Library has changed their online address as well as their website so I’ve just updated my link (which before took people to a blank page – sorry about that). If you haven’t visited the site to browse their free on line novels (all of them old, rare and written by women – some of them Regency romances written during the Regency) be warned it’s a tempting time warp that will suck you in and you won’t want to leave! The library introduces itself like this…
“Novels-On-Line is an ongoing project making freely accessible full-text transcripts of some of the rarest works in the Chawton House Library collection. These texts, which explore such broad-ranging themes as satire, slavery, marriage, witchcraft and piracy, signal the rich texture and innovative character of women’s writing in the period 1600 to 1830. In bringing these little-known novels to a wider audience, it is hoped to stimulate interest in these works amongst a new generation of readers and to encourage critical scholarship of some of the more obscure texts and authors represented in the collection.
Please note that the texts are completely unedited and have been copied from the originals as accurately as possible. Even obvious printer errors have been retained.”
How could you not want to read more? I know…I must not read the library today…I must write…then I can read about pirates and witches (I can feel a witch-pirate villain trying to creep into a mental window). I need to eat breakfast before I start scaring myself.