Anna Seward

Anna Seward was born on December 12, 1742, in Eyam, Derbyshire, and grew up in Lichfield, where her father, Thomas Seward, was a clergyman, writer, and supporter of women’s education. Encouraged from an early age to read and write, she became part of Lichfield’s active intellectual community, which included figures such as Erasmus Darwin and Richard Lovell Edgeworth.

A prolific poet and letter-writer, Seward wrote sonnets, elegies, and longer poems, including Monody on the Death of Major André and Louisa. She also published Memoirs of the Life of Dr. Darwin in 1804, combining biography with her observations of the literary and scientific world around her.

Seward died in Lichfield on March 25, 1809. After her death, Sir Walter Scott edited her Poetical Works, published in 1810, while a substantial selection of her letters appeared in six volumes in 1811.