EDGEWORTH, ej'werth, Maria, English novelist : b. Hare Hatch, near Reading, Berk shire, 1 Jan. 1767; d. Edgeworthtown, Ireland, 21 May 1849. In 1782 her father, Richard Lovell Edgeworth, succeeded to the family es tate of Edgeworthtown, in the county of Long ford, Ireland, and thither he proceeded and took up his abode. In 1802 she established her posi tion as an author by her 'Castle Rackrent,' a novel of Irish life, in which the manners and customs of a by-gone generation are most graphically and humorously described. A (Treatise on Irish Bulls' appeared in 1803;
to the class of regular novels are 'Belinda' (1804) ; 'Leonora' (1806) ;
and (Harrington.' Miss Edgeworth's lively style and vivid imagination made her extremely popu lar in her day. In her pictures of Irish and English life she was the precursor of the genre literature of the succeeding generation. .But her strong tendency to moralize has led to her eclipse in popular favor. It is on the excellence of her vivid representation of the life of her generation that her place in literature is justly based. (See CASTLE RACKRENT). Consult Ritchie, Thackeray Anne, 'Book of Sibyls' (1883) ; Zimmern, (Life of Maria Edgeworth' (1883) ; Howells, W. D., 'Heroines of Fiction' (New York 1901) ; Hill, (Maria Edgeworth and her Circle' (New York 1910).