ABSTRACT
Any discussion about “provincial writing” or about publishing in “the provinces” immediately confronts a difficulty with both terminology and demographics. Given the conviction of cultural superiority that often characterizes urban civic, political, and ecclesiastical centers, “provincial” has perhaps inevitably acquired a deprecatory connotation of parochialism, narrow-mindedness, and lack of education, culture, or sophistication. But by the 1790s, some 988 firms were engaged in various aspects of the book trade in 316 towns and cities more than twenty miles from London. By 1801, the number of “provincial” cities whose populations exceeded 20,000 had grown to fifteen, including manufacturing, port, and resort cities (Raven 141). Many of the women poets who flourished in the relative obscurity of the local provincial press did not publish books at all, but rather had their poetry published in local periodicals – most often daily or weekly newspapers. This essay surveys the several largely discrete categories provincial women poets fall into, and, at the end, offers some recommendations on how to conduct research in this understudied area. The appendices provide lists of women poets who published only in the provinces and those who published both in the provinces and in London, Dublin, and/or Edinburgh.
