Apphia Peach, George Lord Lyttelton, and 'The Correspondents'

“The Correspondents is, indeed, a ‘forgotten gem’—one of the many imitations, arguably the best, of Laurence Sterne and of the kind of sensibility he modeled for contemporaries. Convincingly attributing the work to poet and MP George, Lord Lyttelton, and his daughter-in-law Apphia Peach, Melvyn New presents an intriguing addition to the canon of eighteenth-century literature. Peach, in particular, is an epistolary revelation, and New’s contextualization of the text both situates her fully in her time and argues for her lasting significance.” — Elizabeth Kraft, Professor Emerita of English, University of Georgia

“There are several reasons to read this carefully edited novel: (1) the letters comprising it conjure three sensibilities—the two correspondents’ and Laurence Sterne’s; (2) the Lyttelton of these pages is the Bluestocking Lyttelton, whose preferred soulmates were gifted women; (3) the novel lavishly celebrates male/female ‘intercourse.’” — Deborah Heller, Professor of English, Western New Mexico University, Author of Bluestockings Now!: The Evolution of a Social Role (2015)

“Melvyn New, distinguished editor of Sterne and Richardson, rescues this almost forgotten work by the sickly Lord George Lyttelton, whose love letters to a woman 34 years younger and just returned from India bear a remarkable symmetry to the consumptive parson opening his heart to Eliza Draper, yet another 30 something off to the same colonial territory. With an abundance of documentation New argues persuasively that Lyttelton modeled his epistolary version of unfulfilled desire while confronting death on Sterne.” — John A. Dussinger, Professor Emeritus, University of Illinois

“The first scholarly edition of a forgotten major literary work, inspired by Laurence Sterne and brilliantly introduced by the leading American Sterne scholar.” —Peter de Voogd, Founding editor of The Shandean