The Life, Voyages and Surprising Adventurers of Mary Jane Meadows, a Woman of Uncommon Talents, Spirit and Resolution

[1802] Partial chapbook, pages to 45 present, of this 72pp publication. No cover, pages held together by remnants of backstrip, although also evidence that it was once saddle-stitched. Title page worn, spotted and detached, else internally just some light spotting, mild toning and corner curls. An early 19th century adaption of one of the earliest English novels, Charles Dibdin’s 1796 novel, Hannah Hewit, or The Female Crusoe, this 1802 chapbook involves international travel, shipwrecks, a pet lion, and, shockingly, a woman in trousers! Likely authored by one of London’s leading Chapbook printers, Ann Lemoine. The Adventures of Mary Jane Meadows, although fantastically fictional, turn on a matter of history – the wrecking of the Grosvenor off the coast of Africa in 1782. Hewit’s novel privileged the heroine with independence but to an incredible, laughable degree; Lemoine’s take, perhaps not surprisingly, gives the female lead a more favourable disposition.