Jane Timbury (date of birth unknown, died c. 1792), was an English novelist and poet whose books were published between 1770 and 1791.

Work

Timbury’s novel ''The Male-coquette'' (1770) appeared anonymously, but was republished in 1788 as ''The Male Coquet'' with Timbury’s name added to the title page. It has been called an attempt to bring together various strains and resolve them into a new ideal of husband and gentleman. Timbury’s ''The story of Le Fevre, from the works of Mr. Sterne'' (1787) attempted to increase the drama of

Laurence Sterne Laurence Sterne (24 November 1713 – 18 March 1768), was an Anglo-Irish novelist and Anglican cleric who wrote the novels '' The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman'' and '' A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy'', publish ...

's work by putting it into verse, but has been judged to “contort Tristram’s spontaneous profession of whimsicality into pedestrian metre and verse”. Her book of verse, ''The History of Tobit'', self-published in 1787, included a long list of subscribers, among whom were Samuel Arnold and

Jeremy Bentham Jeremy Bentham (; 15 February 1748 O.S. 4 February 1747">Old_Style_and_New_Style_dates.html" ;"title="nowiki/>Old Style and New Style dates">O.S. 4 February 1747ref name="Johnson2012" /> – 6 June 1832) was an English philosopher, jurist, an ...

.''The History of Tobit; a Poem. With Other Poems on Various Subjects'' (Westminster: The Author, 1787)
p. ix
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Life

Little is known of Timbury. In ''The History of Tobit'' (1787), the author’s address is given as “ Petty France,

Westminster Westminster is an area of Central London, part of the wider City of Westminster. The area, which extends from the River Thames to Oxford Street, has many visitor attractions and historic landmarks, including the Palace of Westminster, Buck ...

”. She may be the Jane Timbury of Fetter Lane whose burial on 25 January 1792 is recorded at St Andrew’s, Holburn, just outside the

City of London The City of London is a city, ceremonial county and local government district that contains the historic centre and constitutes, alongside Canary Wharf, the primary central business district (CBD) of London. It constituted most of London f ...

.Camden St Andrew Holborn Register of Burials
January 1792
at ancestry.co.uk, accessed 1 July 2020 A Mr J. Timbury of Holburn was one of the subscribers to ''The History of Tobit'' five years before, while another Mr Timbury, of Dummer, subscribed for ten copies.

Selected works

* ''The Male-coquette: Or, the History of the Hon. Edward Astell'' (London: G. Robinson and J. Roberts, 1770, new edition by Gale ECCO Print Editions, 2010 ) * ''The History of Tobit; a Poem. With Other Poems on Various Subjects'' (Westminster: the Author, Petty France, 1787) * ''The story of Le Fevre, from the works of Mr. Sterne. Put into verse by Jane Timbury'' (London, 1787; new edition by Gale ECCO Print Editions, 2010 ) *''The Triumph of Friendship; or, The History of Charles Courtney and Miss Julia Melville'' (Westminster: James Fox, 1789) *''The Philanthropic Rambler, etc.'' (London: J. Timbury, J. Southern, & W. Nicoll, 1790) *''A Sequel to the Philanthropic Rambler'' (London: G.G.J. & J. Robinson, R. Faulder, J. Southern, 1791)

Notes

External links

*Jane Timbury
''The History of Tobit; a Poem. With Other Poems on Various Subjects''
(1787, full text at

Google Books Google Books (previously known as Google Book Search, Google Print, and by its code-name Project Ocean) is a service from Google Inc. that searches the full text of books and magazines that Google has scanned, converted to text using optical ...

)
Jane Timbury, "Preface in The History of Tobit" (1788)
at vt.edu * Jane Timbury
"Reflections in a Church-yard"
(poem) at vt.edu {{DEFAULTSORT:Timbury, Jane English women novelists 18th-century novelists 18th-century English women 18th-century English people