Jackson Bibliography of Romantic Poetry

TAYLOR, Jane (1783-1824: ODNB)

She was born to Isaac Taylor (q.v.) and his wife Ann Martin in London less than two years after her sister Ann Taylor (q.v.) and benefited from the same innovative educational program, guided by nonconformist religious principles. The two eldest in the family, the sisters composed stories and verses together for play. At sixteen, Ann won a prize from the annual Minors' Pocket Book and began making occasional contributions to it, followed by other children in the family. In 1803 the publisher, Darton and Harvey, invited them collectively to send more children's poetry for publication, an invitation that led to the first edition of Original Poems for Infant Minds (1804-5), with a preponderance of poems by Ann and Jane Taylor (49 and 43 respectively) as well as a significant number (33) by Adelaide O'Keeffe (q.v.). Over the next ten years the collaboration flourished, notably with Rhymes for the Nursery (1806) which included Jane's "Twinkle, twinkle, little star," and Hymns for Infant Minds (1810), for which Jane herself engraved the frontispiece. After Ann married and left Ongar, Jane began to develop an independent career as an author (for instance, with Essays in Rhyme, 1816) but suffered from breast cancer from 1817 and died in the family home in 1824. She was buried beside her father's chapel in Ongar. Her brother Isaac Taylor (1787-1865) wrote an affectionate memoir to accompany his edition of her literary remains, Memoirs and Poetical Remains of the late Jane Taylor (1825). ("Taylor [née Martin], Ann," "Taylor, Isaac," "Taylor, Jane," ODNB 12 Nov. 2020; Darton; Todd 2; Orlando) 

• Miss Taylor
• J. Taylor

Books written (191):