Margaret Oliphant (1828–1897)
Author of Miss Marjoribanks
About the Author
Margaret Oliphant Wilson Oliphant (née Margaret Oliphant Wilson) (4 April 1828 - 25 June 1897), was a Scottish novelist and historical writer who married her cousin, Frank Wilson Oliphant. Oliphant's first novel was published in 1849, Passages in the Life of Mrs. Margaret Maitland. The book dealt show more with the Scottish Free Church movement. Oliphant, during an often difficult life, wrote more than 120 works, including novels, books of travel and description, histories, and volumes of literary criticism. Among the best known of her works of fiction are: Adam Graeme (1852), The Marriage of Elinor (1892), The Ways of Life (1897). She died at Wimbledon, London, on 25 June 1897. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Image credit: Mrs. Margaret Oliphant (1828-1897)
Series
Works by Margaret Oliphant
The Atlas of the Ancient World: Charting the Great Civilizations of the Past (1992) 171 copies, 1 review
The Literary History of England in the End of the Eighteenth and Beginning of the Nineteenth Century (1882) 9 copies
Delphi Works of Margaret Oliphant with Complete Stories of the Seen and Unseen (Illustrated) (Series Five Book 18) (2015) 7 copies
Passages in the Life of Mrs. Margaret Maitland of Sunnyside - Scholar's Choice Edition (2009) 7 copies
Merkland, a Story of Scottish Life, by the Author of 'passages in the Life of Mrs. Margaret Maitland'. (2009) 4 copies
Annals of a publishing house : William Blackwood and his sons, their magazine and friends Volume II 4 copies
The Literary History of England in the End of the Eighteenth and Beginning of the Nineteenth Century, Volume 2 (1882) 3 copies
Annals of a publishing house: William Blackwood and his sons, their magazine and friends (1974) 3 copies
Memoirs and Resolutions of Adam Graeme of Mossgray. Including Some Chronicles of the Borough of Fendie: Volume 2 (1999) 3 copies
Annals of a publishing house: William Blackwood and his sons, their magazine and friends vol 1 (1974) 3 copies
Lillies Leaf: being a concluding series of Passages in the Life of Mrs. Margaret Maitland, etc. 2 copies
The Literary History of England in the End of the Eighteenth and Beginning of the Nineteenth Century, Volume 3 (1882) 2 copies
Agnes Hopetoun's schools and holidays : the experiences of a little girl / with illustrations (1859) 2 copies
La finestra 2 copies
The Life and Times of Queen Victoria - with which is incorporated "The Domestic Life of the Queen" 1 copy
The Literary History of England in the End of the Eighteenth and Beginning of the Nineteenth Century, Volume 1 (1882) 1 copy
Heart and Cross 1 copy
Annals of a publishing house: William Blackwood and his sons, their magazine and friends vol 3 (1974) 1 copy
A Son of the Soil. A novel 1 copy
Diana Trelawny 1 copy
The Quiet Heart, by the Author of 'katie Stewart'. (Orig. Publ. in Blackwood's Magazine). (2012) 1 copy
A little pilgrim 1 copy
Oliphant Margaret 1 copy
Dante. 1 copy
John, a love story 1 copy
Mercy Philbrick's Choice 1 copy
The minister's wife 1 copy
Associated Works
Pride and Prejudice [Norton Critical Edition, 3rd ed.] (2001) — Contributor — 1,030 copies, 13 reviews
The Penguin Book of Ghost Stories: From Elizabeth Gaskell to Ambrose Bierce (2010) — Contributor — 186 copies, 4 reviews
The Valancourt Book of Victorian Christmas Ghost Stories (2016) — Contributor — 184 copies, 6 reviews
The Phantom Coach: A Connoisseur's Collection of Victorian Ghost Stories (2014) — Contributor — 63 copies, 1 review
British Women Writers: An Anthology from the Fourteenth Century to the Present (1989) — Contributor — 61 copies, 1 review
The Lifted Veil: The Book of Fantastic Literature by Women 1800-World War II (1806) — Contributor — 45 copies
The Gentlewomen of Evil: An Anthology of Rare Supernatural Stories from the Pens of Victorian Ladies (1967) — Contributor — 28 copies
The Third Ghost Story Megapack: 26 Classic Ghost Stories (2013) — Contributor — 19 copies, 2 reviews
A Serious Occupation: Literary Criticism by Victorian Women Writers (2003) — Contributor — 15 copies
The Other voice : Scottish women's writing since 1808 : an anthology (1988) — Contributor — 10 copies
The Wimbourne Book of Victorian Ghost Stories (Annotated): Volume 16 (2023) — Contributor — 4 copies
The Wimbourne Book of Victorian Ghost Stories (Annotated): Volume 10 (2018) — Contributor — 3 copies
The Midnight Inkwell: Sinister Short Stories by Classic Women Writers (2023) — Contributor — 3 copies
Memoirs of the life of Anna Jameson, etc. [With a postscript by Mrs. M. O. Oliphant.] — Postscript — 2 copies
Wakacje Wśród Duchów — Contributor — 2 copies
Gwiazdka Z Duchami 1 copy
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Other names
- Oliphant, Margaret Oliphant Wilson (married name)
Wilson, Margaret Oliphant (birth name)
Melville, Christian (pen name)
Oliphant, Mrs. - Birthdate
- 1828-04-04
- Date of death
- 1897-06-25
- Gender
- female
- Occupations
- writer
cultural historian
novelist
essayist
autobiographer - Short biography
- Margaret Oliphant Wilson was born in Wallyford, near Musselburgh, Scotland, the daughter of a customs house official. The family moved to Liverpool, England, when she was a child. She began writing as a teenager. In 1852, she married her cousin Francis Oliphant, an artist, and turned to writing to help support them and their seven children. Her first published work was Passages in the Life of Margaret Maitland (1849), and she became a regular contributor to Blackwood's Literary Magazine. Her husband died in 1859 while on a family trip to Italy, leaving Margaret pregnant. John Blackwood sent her funds to enable her to return to England and to relocate to Elie in Fife. She wrote more than 100 novels, biographies, translations, travel books, and collections of short stories during her prolific career. Her best-remembered works are the group of novels known as The Chronicles of Carlingford, which consisted of The Rector and the Doctor’s Family (1863), Salem Chapel (1863), The Perpetual Curate (1864), Miss Majoribanks (1866), and Phoebe Junior (1876). Many of her popular works focused on Scottish life, including The Minister’s Wife (1869) and Kirsteen (1890). She also wrote a volume of supernatural stories, Tales of the Seen and Unseen, and an autobiography that was published posthumously in 1899.
- Nationality
- UK
- Birthplace
- Wallyford, Haddingtonshire, Scotland, UK
- Places of residence
- Florence, Italy
Rome, Italy
London, Middlesex, England, UK
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, UK
Edinburgh, Midlothian, Scotland, UK
Windsor, Berkshire, England, UK (show all 8)
Glasgow, Lanarkshire, Scotland, UK
Lasswade, Midlothian, Scotland, UK - Place of death
- Wimbledon, London, Middlesex, England, UK
- Burial location
- Eton Parish Cemetery, Eton, Berkshire, England, UK
- Map Location
- Scotland, UK
Members
Discussions
Margaret Oliphant's Chronicles of Carlingford 6: Phoebe, Junior in Virago Modern Classics (June 2023)
Margaret Oliphant's Chronicles of Carlingford 5: Miss Marjoribanks in Virago Modern Classics (March 2023)
Margaret Oliphant's Chronicles of Carlingford 3: Salem Chapel in Virago Modern Classics (November 2022)
Victorian Readalong Q3: Hester by Margaret Oliphant in Club Read 2022 (September 2022)
Margaret Oliphant's Chronicles of Carlingford 4: The Perpetual Curate in Virago Modern Classics (August 2022)
Margaret Oliphant's Chronicles of Carlingford 2: The Doctor's Family in Virago Modern Classics (November 2021)
Margaret Oliphant's Chronicles of Carlingford 1: The Executor / The Rector in Virago Modern Classics (November 2021)
Reviews
After her father's death Abroad, teenage Hester and her widowed mother are offered a home in the generic English town of Redborough by their rich cousin Miss Catherine Vernon. There's a kind of Mansfield Park setup, where Hester is presented with a range of potential suitors from among the assembled cousins, with a range of different obstacles to overcome.
But this turns out not really to be what the book is about at all: Hester is determined to challenge the prevailing "Angel of the hearth" show more idea of what the role of middle-class Woman should be in life. Hester is not content to provide sympathy, moral guidance and domestic efficiency while some man goes out and does things for her; she wants to work and have a real part in informed decision-making. Catherine is the key example that proves it can be done: when the family banking firm was teetering on the edge of collapse (the fault of Hester's father, although Hester doesn't know this) Catherine stepped in to rescue it and ran it successfully for twenty years. Mrs Oliphant, a widow herself, had been supporting her family by her writing for 25 years when this was published, so she knew what she was talking about.
Of course Catherine and Hester dislike each other at sight — they are far too alike — and of course Catherine manages to hold conservative opinions completely inconsistent with her own history, so sparks fly between them.
That part of the plot is all quite fun, but it doesn't really get going until Volume 3, and there are a lot of balls and tea-parties to get through before then, mostly rather repetitive. For a long stretch of Volume 2 it feels as though the plot isn't advancing at all, whilst Oliphant tries to dig out subtle social distinctions through close examination of furniture, dress, hair and speech patterns. There are some jokes — the comic chorus of poor relatives, the notion that "Abroad" is a specific place (like Basingstoke but more exotic), the single-minded husband-hunting of Emma, etc. — but on the whole it's rather heavy going. Oliphant is clearly best at getting inside the heads of her older characters, so Hester and her male cousins often seem surprisingly opaque to the reader, whilst Catherine and old Captain Morgan (not-a-pirate) are very human and believable. show less
But this turns out not really to be what the book is about at all: Hester is determined to challenge the prevailing "Angel of the hearth" show more idea of what the role of middle-class Woman should be in life. Hester is not content to provide sympathy, moral guidance and domestic efficiency while some man goes out and does things for her; she wants to work and have a real part in informed decision-making. Catherine is the key example that proves it can be done: when the family banking firm was teetering on the edge of collapse (the fault of Hester's father, although Hester doesn't know this) Catherine stepped in to rescue it and ran it successfully for twenty years. Mrs Oliphant, a widow herself, had been supporting her family by her writing for 25 years when this was published, so she knew what she was talking about.
Of course Catherine and Hester dislike each other at sight — they are far too alike — and of course Catherine manages to hold conservative opinions completely inconsistent with her own history, so sparks fly between them.
That part of the plot is all quite fun, but it doesn't really get going until Volume 3, and there are a lot of balls and tea-parties to get through before then, mostly rather repetitive. For a long stretch of Volume 2 it feels as though the plot isn't advancing at all, whilst Oliphant tries to dig out subtle social distinctions through close examination of furniture, dress, hair and speech patterns. There are some jokes — the comic chorus of poor relatives, the notion that "Abroad" is a specific place (like Basingstoke but more exotic), the single-minded husband-hunting of Emma, etc. — but on the whole it's rather heavy going. Oliphant is clearly best at getting inside the heads of her older characters, so Hester and her male cousins often seem surprisingly opaque to the reader, whilst Catherine and old Captain Morgan (not-a-pirate) are very human and believable. show less
This is the first novel I have read by Mrs Oliphant, and I found it refreshingly feminist and (for a Victorian novel) easy to read. Hester is part of the Vernon family, who own a bank. Although Hester has been kept in ignorance of this, her (now dead) father nearly ruined the bank and ran off, leaving his cousin Catherine to save the day, despite the fact that she was a woman... Now years later, Catherine has handed the bank's management over to Harry and Edward, both of whom are attracted show more to Hester. (Almost all the characters are distantly related to each other, but I gave up trying to keep the family tree straight in my head.)
The characterization here is excellent, and the misunderstandings that keep Catherine and Hester at odds for the majority of the book had me wanting to point out to them how similar they are. Emma, who does not appear until half way through the book, is extremely amusing, and I was kept guessing throughout about Hester's love life.
Highly recommended. Apparently Mrs Oliphant wrote nearly 100 novels, so that will keep me busy! show less
The characterization here is excellent, and the misunderstandings that keep Catherine and Hester at odds for the majority of the book had me wanting to point out to them how similar they are. Emma, who does not appear until half way through the book, is extremely amusing, and I was kept guessing throughout about Hester's love life.
Highly recommended. Apparently Mrs Oliphant wrote nearly 100 novels, so that will keep me busy! show less
This was SUCH a lovely read (far better than its prequel "Salem Chapel." ) Our eponymous hero, Frank Wentworth, the young perpetual curate, is making great strides in his parish. With a devoted young lady in the wings and a congregation who esteem him, all is going well.
But clouds are on the horizon...a new Rector finding fault, critical aunts, an unwanted admirer, and an older brother contemplating leaving his own career in the church to become a Catholic...
And as mysterious "black sheep" show more relatives show up, and someone goes missing, there are many difficulties to bear.
Very good characterization, especially of the quietly determined Rector's wife,whose ability to demolish bumptious visitors with a pithy comment has to be a role model for us all.
Keeps you reading to the last page. A bit of Victorian escapism. show less
But clouds are on the horizon...a new Rector finding fault, critical aunts, an unwanted admirer, and an older brother contemplating leaving his own career in the church to become a Catholic...
And as mysterious "black sheep" show more relatives show up, and someone goes missing, there are many difficulties to bear.
Very good characterization, especially of the quietly determined Rector's wife,whose ability to demolish bumptious visitors with a pithy comment has to be a role model for us all.
Keeps you reading to the last page. A bit of Victorian escapism. show less
Grace Trevanian's husband married her in Europe when she was in desperate circumstances and treated her despicably for most of their marriage. Despite his ill-treatment Grace nursed the querulous invalid devotedly, but days from his demise the vicious old man re-wrote his will to punish her further. I won't say how, because that would destroy the suspense.
Rosalind is Grace's stepdaughter, and calls her mother because Grace is the only mother Rosalind has ever known. She is loyal to Grace show more despite wicked rumours, most of them perpetrated by the family nurse who brought up Rosalind and her four half-brothers and sisters. The nurse has tried to poison the younger children's minds against their mother, and has carried malicious stories to Grace's husband.
Somewhere I read that this was Margaret Oliphant's favourite of her books. It has less humour than the Carlingford series because Grace is such a tragic figure, and so ill-treated, but there is some in the sketches of the minor characters, particularly Aunt Sophy. I was very much engaged because I had to find out what would happen to Grace and Rosalind. show less
Rosalind is Grace's stepdaughter, and calls her mother because Grace is the only mother Rosalind has ever known. She is loyal to Grace show more despite wicked rumours, most of them perpetrated by the family nurse who brought up Rosalind and her four half-brothers and sisters. The nurse has tried to poison the younger children's minds against their mother, and has carried malicious stories to Grace's husband.
Somewhere I read that this was Margaret Oliphant's favourite of her books. It has less humour than the Carlingford series because Grace is such a tragic figure, and so ill-treated, but there is some in the sketches of the minor characters, particularly Aunt Sophy. I was very much engaged because I had to find out what would happen to Grace and Rosalind. show less
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Statistics
- Works
- 244
- Also by
- 53
- Members
- 3,141
- Popularity
- #8,122
- Rating
- 4.0
- Reviews
- 110
- ISBNs
- 531
- Languages
- 9
- Favorited
- 13
