ABSTRACT
This chapter analyses the ways in which Mary smith represented herself in relation to others and considers what her life story might be seen to represent. Smith’s sense of the common people was rooted, therefore, in these particularly local forms of patriotism, which were more important to her sense of 'Englishness' than the imperialist representation of national identity which gained currency during her adult life. Smith's reworking of Burns's ballads, which celebrated the homely patriotism of the common Scottish people, indicates how she associated the common people with regional identities. If Smith's commitment to the rights of women stemmed in part from her experience as a philanthropist, there was also a psychic or emotional dimension to her feminism. Smith's analysis was fundamentally radical in character. Radicalism aimed to redraw the political landscape by the extension of political representation but it also sought to change the balance between local and national cultures, and even between nations.
