A comical dialogue between maggy and janet, or, "The folly of witless women displayed." With an oration on the virtues of the old women, and the pride of the young. With directions To Young Men what sort of Women to take, and for Women what sort of Men to marry. Dictated by Janet Clinker, and Written by Humphry Clinker, the Clashing Wives Clerk

CLINKER, Humphry

Published by Printed by and for D. Webster and Son, Edinburgh, 1820

About this Item

24pp. Uncut and unstitched, as issued. Housed in recent custom brown cloth clamshell case. Lightly browned. A sole Regency, and seemingly final published edition of a humorous Scottish chapbook, first published at Glasgow in 1772 as The folly of witless women displayâ d; or, the history of haverel wives. The work has on occasion been attributed to prolific poet and chapbook writer Dougal Graham (bap. 1721, d. 1779), this seems likely, particularly as it composed in coarse vernacular Scots prose typical of that master of the demotic, and presents bawdy and anarchic scenes of love and marital strife common in his writings. The pseudonym Humphrey Clinker is without question a reference to the titular character of Tobias Smollett's (1721-1771) epistolary picturesque comic masterpiece, The Expedition of Humphry Clinker (1771). This has led some to conclude that Smollett must be responsible for the publication, though this reasoning seems spurious, and likely the name is nothing more than an attempt by unscrupulous publisher's to capitalise on the tremendous success of Smollett's novel. All editions are scarce, with this nineteenth-century edition being no exception; COPAC records copies at five locations (BL, Cambridge, Manchester, NLS, and Oxford), OCLC adds no further. Size: 8vo. Seller Inventory # AQ25666

Bibliographic Details

Title: A comical dialogue between maggy and janet, ...

Publisher: Printed by and for D. Webster and Son, Edinburgh

Publication Date: 1820

Binding: Hardcover