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Domestic Sensationalism Florence Marryat, Love’s Conflict (1865)


On 2 November 1899, about eighty people gathered in the Church of Our Lady, Grove End Road, the small Catholic church in St John’s Wood, that respectable suburb of North London. They had come to pay their final respects to Florence Marryat (b. 1833), novelist, journalist, spiritualist, actress, lecturer, singer, teacher, who had, as The Era noted, ‘in the course of a busy career … produced something like seventy novels and works of travel’ and in doing so had ‘obtained a very wide popularity’. Amongst those paying their respects were Marryat’s children and grandchildren, her old servant, Selina Nicholls, and a small collection of celebrities: the actor and satirist, George Grossmith, the novelist Annie Thomas, the playwright Arthur à Beckett, and members of the D’Oyly Carte opera company, with whom Marryat had once performed. The tributes were led by The Times, who recalled Marryat’s ‘dual capacity’ as novelist and actress, her ‘dramatic instinct’, and her hallowed status as a daughter of the much-loved novelist Captain Frederick Marryat R. N ‘from whom it may be presumed that she inherited her literary talents’. But The Times also expressed the thoughts of many when it suggested that if Marryat were remembered at all (which seemed unlikely) it would be solely for her ‘great industry’, which characterized her whole life, rather than for her literary endeavours. Whilst it was true that Marryat’s novels – apparently produced ‘without any great effort on her part’ – had enjoyed ‘a great deal of popularity’ in their time, the novelist herself had always recognized their ephemerality, being fully conscious that she lacked her father’s claims to permanent greatness. She would not expect or want anything more.

Volume Contents

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    Front Matter
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    Introduction By Andrew Maunder
  • Love’s Conflict (1865) By Florence Marryat
    • Volume I By Florence Marryat
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        1
        On the Sands
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        2
        Which is Retrospective
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        3
        Hélène Du Broissart
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        4
        The Master of Ariscedwyn
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        5
        George Refuses to Be Reasonable
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        6
        Agnes Treherne
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        7
        Sorel Cottage
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        8
        Hélène at School
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        9
        Chelton Marsh Deserted
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        10
        Youth at the Helm and Pleasure at the Prow
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        11
        The Expensive Puppy
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        12
        A Night in Malta
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        13
        A Great Mistake
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        14
        Scarcely Worth it
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        15
        Death in Milborough
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        16
        Meeting
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        17
        Doubts and Fears
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        18
        Mother and Son
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        19
        Elfrida’s Fate Is Decided
    • Volume II By Florence Marryat
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        20
        Parting
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        21
        Christmas at Ariscedwyn
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        22
        Husband and Wife
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        23
        They Meet
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        24
        First Impressions
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        25
        A Compact of Friendship
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        26
        George Changes his Mind
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        27
        John Read
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        28
        Il Tempesto Del Mio Cor.
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        29
        Open Eyes
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        30
        Beyond Seas
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        31
        Together Again
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        32
        Desperate
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        33
        The Life Struggle
    • Volume III By Florence Marryat
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        34
        Past and Gone
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        35
        Mr. Treherne Gets His Own Way
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        36
        New Servant at Ariscedwyn
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        37
        The Last Drop in the Cup
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        38
        Over
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        39
        Better Thoughts
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        40
        The Oath Put into Execution
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        41
        The Arrest
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        42
        Elfrida Betrays Herself
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        43
        Change Upon Change
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        44
        At the Hermitage
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        45
        A Slip On Mont Blanc
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        46
        William Treherne Has Time for Thought
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        47
        Peace Between Them
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        48
        Vale
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    Back Matter