Giving Nineteenth Century Women Writers a Voice and a Face — Amy Judith Levy (1861–1889)

Amy Levy. “Philosophy” in A London Plane-tree, and Other Verse (1899)

 Amy Levy was a precocious feminist, reviewing Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s Aurora Leigh when she was only thirteen. She wrote lyric poems, dramatic monologues, essays, stories, and novels. Through her writings, she focused  attention on Jewish identity, feminist positions, and homosexual relationships. She struggled with “constitutional melancholy” and eventually committed suicide. The Armstrong Browning Library owns one title by Amy Levy. Logo from A London Plane-tree, and Other Verse. London: T. Fisher Unwin, 1889.

The volume owned by the ABL is a first edition, number 21 of 30 copies, signed by the publisher. An inscription on the recto of the leaf following the title-page states: “The proofs of this volume were corrected by the Author about a week before her death.”

Melinda Creech