Mary Wortley Montagu, The Nonsense of Common-Sense

Emrys Daniel Blakelee Jones (University of Greenwich)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.1.05: English Writing and Culture from the Glorious Revolution to the French Revolution, 1689-1789.
Vol. editors: Paul Baines (University of Liverpool), Daniel Cook (University of Dundee), Pat Rogers (University of South Florida), Nicholas Seager (University of Keele)

Domains

Periodicals

Dates

First circulation or publication 1737 - 1738

Places

England (Country of Origin)

Resources

The Nonsense of Common-Sense was a short-lived periodical, published in London between December 1737 and March 1738. Thanks to the efforts of twentieth-century scholars, Robert Halsband and Isobel Grundy, its anonymous author is now known to have been Lady Mary Wortley Montagu (1689-1762). She, unlike her husband Edward, was a loyal supporter of prime minister Robert Walpole and his government. Nonsense represents her most forthright engagement with the partisan debates of her day, though it frequently claims for itself a degree of political neutrality.

The periodical, which ran to nine numbers, was published most regularly – at times weekly – during January 1738; however, its appearances became …

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1763 words

Citation: Jones, Emrys Daniel Blakelee. "The Nonsense of Common-Sense". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 22 April 2008 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=52, accessed 24 November 2024.]

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