Author: Lovell, Robert
Biography:
LOVELL, Robert (1771-96: ODNB)
He was born on 25 Oct. 1771 at Thomas Street, Bristol, the third of ten children of Robert Lovell (1746-1804), a wealthy Quaker pin manufacturer, and his first wife, Edith Bourne (1741-81), who had married in 1768. Nothing is known of his early education and he seems to have entered the family business. His first work, Bristol: A Satire (1794), a fairly loose imitation of Charles Churchill (q.v.), was openly critical of Bristol commercial culture. He married Mary Fricker (1771-1862) on 20 Jan. 1794 at St. Mary Redcliffe, Bristol. They had one son. His father disapproved of the match because Mary Fricker was not a Quaker and had briefly been an actress. S. T. Coleridge (q.v.) married Sara Fricker on 4 Oct. 1795. Southey (q.v.) married Edith Fricker on 14 Nov. 1795. The marriages were in part contracted to help establish twelve couples in a utopian egalitarian settlement in Susquehanna Valley, Pennsylvania, but the scheme was a disorganised pipe-dream and never got off the ground. With Southey Lovell published Poems (1795) with his contributions signed “Moschus.” They were mostly commonplace and unoriginal: “Elegy. The Decayed Farm-House,” “Elegy. The Decayed Monastery.” His sonnets were also on well-worn themes: “To Fame,” “To Sensibility,” etc. His contribution to the three-act tragedy which later appeared under Coleridge’s name, The Fall of Robespierre (1794), was rejected. Thomas Park included him in The Works of the British Poets (vol 41, 1808) which also reprinted “Bristol, A Satire.” His work was also reprinted in Ezekiel Sandford, The Works of the British Poets (vol 37, 1822). In 1796 he contracted a fever in Salisbury and his condition deteriorated as he travelled home. Edith Southey, his sister-in-law, nursed him for three days at some risk to herself. He died at his house in the Old Market, Bristol, on 3 May and was buried on 6 May at Fryer’s Burying Ground, Bristol (Quaker). After his death, his father gave sporadic assistance to his widow and child but it was left to the ever-generous Southey to step in and ask her to join his household. Southey also attempted to raise subscriptions for a posthumous edition of Lovell’s poems for her benefit, but failed. Mary Lovell later moved with the Southeys to Greta Hall, Keswick. After Southey’s death, she lived with his unmarried daughter, Kate. (ODNB 19 Sept. 2023; DNB; Bath Journal 9 May 1796; romantic-circles.org) AA