A comparative Study of the British and Spanish Nineteenth-Century Reception of Felicia Hemans

Abstract

The popularity enjoyed by Felicia Hemans (1783–1835) in nineteenth-century Britain was determined by the progressive feminization of her literary work and a critical discourse marked by gender bias which together constructed an image of the author as a model of womanhood. While the reception of her male peers within the Spanish literary system has been widely discussed, Hemans’s has been totally neglected. Through a comparative analysis of both receptions, this essay throws light on the singular process through which the encounter with a freshly discovered literary tradition facilitated the unprejudiced inclusion of a female poet in the English Parnassus created by nineteenth-century Spanish authors and critics.