GRIFFITH, ELIZABETH (1727 - 1793), author

Born in Glamorgan on 11 October 1727. Little is known of her before her marriage to Richard Griffith, an Irishman, c. 1752. Thereafter she acted on the Dublin and London stage and in 1757 published A Series of Genuine Letters between Henry and Frances, which was at once a novel and a selection in two volumes of correspondence between Richard Griffith and herself before marriage. She wrote many plays after 1765, of which The School for Rakes (1769) was, and is, the most rewarding. She essayed poetry, did much translation from the French, and wrote other novels; and in 1775 she published The Morality of Shakespeare's Drama Illustrated. She died in Ireland 5 January 1793. Her children were Richard (1752 - 1820) and Catherine.

Author

• Professor Gwyn Jones, (1907 - 1999)

Sources

• Baker, Biographia Dramatica (London 1812), i, 301
• The Cambridge history of English literature (1908-1927)
• Oxford Dictionary of National Biography

Further Reading

• J. M. S. Tompkins, The polite marriage: also The Didactic Lyre, The Bristol Milkwoman, The Scotch Parents, Clio in Motley and Mary Hays, Philosophess (Cambridge 1938)
• Wikipedia Article: Elizabeth Griffith

Additional Links

• VIAF: 36955786
• Wikidata: RHIF WIKIDATA

Published date: 1959

Article Copyright: http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/