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Fay's graphic letters begin in Paris on 18 April 1779; her account suggests she had been to France several times before. Then follows an eventful journey across the Alps, by sea to Egypt, then across the deserts of Egypt in a caravan that was attacked by bandits, only to be imprisoned on arrival in
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Fay died insolvent, and her invaluable letters were handled by the administrator of her estate as one of her few assets. Her account of the first two voyages appeared in 1817 and, according to official records, made a profit for her creditors of 220 rupees in four years. However, the administrator
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Supreme Court. The couple set out for India in April 1779 and he managed to enter himself on 16 June 1780, but he ran into debt and fathered an illegitimate child before returning to
England, where he died some time before 1815. The couple separated in August 1781. There were no children of the
143:. This she continued to run with a partner, Maria Cousins, until 1814. She stayed in Blackheath with Mrs Preston in 1815, before a final voyage to Calcutta, where she began to prepare her letters and papers for publication. She died at the age of 60 on 9 September 1816 in Calcutta.
82:, her editor, described as "little character sketches... delightfully malicious." She appears to have had religious convictions and a distaste for any indelicacy, also a command of French and an ability to learn other languages such as Italian, Portuguese and
156:, so that the published versions go only up to 1797. The volume was reprinted in 1821. Later glimpses of her life, including some surviving manuscript pages, and English court and other archive materials, come from notes by her 1908 editor,
90:, but this goodwill may have been dissipated by the wild behaviour of her husband, or possibly by her own ill temper. She was more interested than many in the life of the Indians around her and provides quite a lot of detail.
34:, Surrey. She was one of three known daughters of Edward Clement (died 1794), a Rotherhithe shipwright. Her mother died in or before 1783. Little is known of her family. One of her sisters, Eleanor, married Thomas W. Preston.
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on the death of her father and became a merchant, but was dogged by disasters, so that bankruptcy ensued again in 1800. Her third visit to
Calcutta in 1796 lasted only six months. She acquired another ship, loaded it with
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Original letters from India : containing a narrative of a journey through Egypt and the author's imprisonment at
Calicut by Hyder Ally, to which is added an abstract of three subsequent voyages to
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Her business partner Avis Hicks and
Anthony Fay's son, whom Hicks was accompanying to England, drowned at sea in September 1786. Returning to England in 1794, Eliza inherited property in
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116:(immolation of a widow), she opined, was not a proof of feeling, but "entirely a political scheme intended to insure the care and good offices of wives to their husbands."
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at high speed, but otherwise not much education. Eliza Fay found her way into
Calcutta society during her first period there, meeting several prominent people, including
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22:(1755 or 1756 – 9 September 1816) was an English letter writer. She left graphic accounts of her travels and experiences in Europe and the Middle East.
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41:, on 6 February 1772 in London. The only son of Francis Fay of Rotherhithe, Surrey, and of Irish extraction, he intended to practise as an
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Sailing again for
Calcutta in August 1804, she returned the following year with 14 children, to open a school at Ashburnam House,
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437:, pp. 274–313. New Haven/London: Yale University Press, 2019. Accessed 8 February 2021. doi:10.2307/j.ctvnwc044.15.
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in 1782, but set out again in 1784. This time her social status was lower and she supported herself with a
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making, but became bankrupt in 1788, although she continued to trade and paid off her creditors by 1793.
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Fay obtained a legal separation from her husband in August 1781, and returned to
England by way of
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The
Feminist Companion to Literature in English. Women Writers from the Middle Ages to the Present
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Mohamad Ali
Hachicho, "English Travel Books about the Arab near East in the Eighteenth Century".
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Edited and introduced by Rev. Walter Kelly
Firminger (Calcutta: Thacker, Spink & Co., 1908).
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This edition was superseded in 1925 by E. M. Forster's scholarly edition, published by
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Linda Colley, "Going Native, Telling Tales: Captivity, Collaborations and Empire",
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To Begin the World Over Again: How the American Revolution Devastated the Globe
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444:, New Series 9, no. 1/4 (1964), pp. 1–206. Accessed 8 February 2021.
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and set off for the United States, but it sank in the mouth of the
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Her observation and interpretations of Indian society continued.
75:, Mr Isaac, she and her husband arrived in Calcutta in May 1780.
71:. Eventually escaping with the help of a Jewish merchant from
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The letters reveal great narrative power and include what
427:, No. 168 (2000), pp. 170–193. Accessed 8 February 2021.
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Virginia Blain, Patricia Clements and Isobel Grundy:
399:, 1st ed., New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2013
433:Matthew Lockwood, "The birth of British India".
168:. In 2010, this edition was again reprinted by
214:Retrieved 9 March 2011. Subscription required.
8:
518:Writers from the London Borough of Southwark
30:Eliza was born in 1755 or 1756, probably in
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160:(1870–1940), author of the long-running
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378:E. M. Forster: Introductory Notes. In:
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16:English writer on India, 1755/1756–1816
411:Original Letters from India, 1779–1815
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132:. She managed by other means to reach
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543:19th-century British letter writers
528:18th-century English businesspeople
397:: British Women in India, 1615–1856
483:19th-century British women writers
478:18th-century English women writers
429:http://www.jstor.org/stable/651308
339:The Original Letters from India...
304:. Bengal Inventories, 1821, Vol 3.
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533:British people in colonial India
152:"lost enthusiasm" according to
1:
538:19th-century English diarists
352:"Original Letters from India"
37:Eliza married Anthony Fay, a
508:British women travel writers
488:19th-century British writers
162:Thacker's Guide to Calcutta.
380:Original Letters from India
326:National Portrait Gallery:
261:Original Letters from India
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382:(New York: NYRB, 2010 ).
392:Joan Mickelson-Gaughan,
317:(Calcutta: s. n., 1817).
283:: London, 1990), p. 360.
172:with an introduction by
503:People from Rotherhithe
328:Retrieved 9 March 2011.
147:Editions of the letters
513:British travel writers
493:English letter writers
158:Walter Kelly Firminger
356:New York Review Books
170:New York Review Books
136:on 3 September 1797.
498:Women letter writers
394:The "incumberances"
302:India Office Records
263:..., pp. 202–207 ff.
186:Women letter writers
442:Die Welt des Islams
292:Forster, pp. 10–12.
425:Past & Present
418:Additional reading
523:British milliners
388:978-1-59017-336-7
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473:1816 deaths
409:Eliza Fay,
32:Rotherhithe
462:Categories
192:References
141:Blackheath
84:Hindustani
67:, King of
50:marriage.
26:Early life
121:Glamorgan
103:millinery
99:St Helena
65:Hyder Ali
39:barrister
20:Eliza Fay
361:14 April
281:Batsford
180:See also
47:Calcutta
43:advocate
130:Hooghly
126:muslins
61:Calicut
45:in the
386:
114:Suttee
107:mantua
95:Madras
73:Cochin
69:Mysore
315:India
384:ISBN
363:2021
97:and
63:by
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