Author: Mackey, Mary
Biography:
MACKEY, Mary (fl 1810)
Mackey was her married name but before 1809 she was a widow and by that time middle-aged (“a matron of about 45” [British Stage] so born about 1764). No reliable information about her life has been found in the public record. Inference from her own writings indicates that she was uneducated, though literate, and had been married to a man “old enough to be her father, [who] ever treated her like a child.” Her husband, a London conveyancer, left her a small annuity. She consulted at least two literary figures about her poetic ambitions: a young Hewson Clarke (1787-1845) advised against publication but elderly, blind John Wolcot (q.v.) encouraged her. According to “K”—Thomas Kenrick, editor of The British Stage and Literary Cabinet in 1817—she accordingly gave up her annuity to pay publishing costs and was thereby reduced to great distress. K concludes that the volume is “excessively ridiculous” but amusing. (ancestry.com 15 Feb. 2023; N&Q 29 Jan. 1853, 109-10; British Stage Sept. 1817, 210-12) HJ
Other Names:
- Mrs. Mary Mackey