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Elizabeth Ryves

Ireland 1750 – 1797-04-29 London English, French, Italian Main: London novelist playwright poet translator Ryves, Elizabeth, 1750-1797 (viaf) Elizabeth Ryves (wikidata)

Contributions

  1. A Letter from the Abbé Raynal to the National Assembly of France, on the Subject of the Revolution, and the Philosophical Principles which led to it ... With the Original French: To which is added, the declaration of the Chevalier Bintinaye, on the resignation of his commission and pension translation translator
  2. An inquiry into the nature of the social contract, or, Principles of political right. Translated from the French by John James Rousseau translation has paratext has other edition uncertainty translator
  3. An inquiry into the nature of the social contract, or, Principles of political right. Translated from the French by John James Rousseau translation uncertainty translator
  4. An inquiry into the nature of the social contract, or, Principles of political right. Translated from the French by John James Rousseau paratext uncertainty author
  5. A review of the constitutions of the principal states of Europe, and of the United States of America translation has paratext translator
  6. A review of the constitutions of the principal states of Europe, and of the United States of America paratext author
  7. Extract from Rousseau's Social Contract translation uncertainty translator

Notes

Ryves' ONDB entry by Elizabeth Lee, revised by Rebecca Mills, provides an intriguing snapshot of her brief, impoverished life.

"Ryves, Elizabeth (1750–1797), writer, was born in Ireland in 1750 and was descended from an old Irish family connected with that of Bruno Ryves (c.1596–1677). She owned some property, but, being cheated out of it 'by the chicanery of the law', fell into poverty, and went to London to petition the king in 1775 and to earn a living by her pen. She wrote political articles for newspapers, verses, plays, and learned French in order to produce translations. She translated into English Rousseau's Social Contract, Raynal's Letter to the National Assembly, and Delacroix's Review of the Constitutions of the Principal States of Europe (1792); she also attempted to translate Froissart, but gave it up as too difficult.

For some time she is said to have conducted the historical and political portions of Dodsley's Annual Register. In 1777 she published her Poems on Several Occasions. Ryves's dramatic efforts, The Prude (1777), a comic opera in three acts, and The Debt of Honour, were accepted by a theatrical manager, but were never acted; she received £100 as compensation. She wrote one novel, The Hermit of Snowden, or, Memoirs of Albert and Lavinia (1789), said to be an account of her own life. Her other works include The Triumph of Hymen (1777), Ode to the Rev. William Mason (1780), Dialogues in the Elysian Fields (1785), and The Hastiniad, an Heroick Poem (1785). She died unmarried and in poverty on 29 April 1797 in Store Street, Tottenham Court Road, London. Isaac D'Israeli, to whom she was personally known, expended much pity on her fate in his Calamities of Authors (1812)."

See Isaac Disraeli, 'The Calamities and Quarrels of Authors. With Some Inquiries Respecting Their Moral and Literary Characters, and Memoirs for Our Literary History. Volume 1 (1812).