"Slovenly Monthly Catalogues": The Monthly Review and Barbauld's Periodical Literary Criticism‪.‬

Anna Letitia Barbauld, one of the eighteenth century's most highly-regarded women poets, was also the early nineteenth century's most important British woman literary critic. She not only published a large body of essay criticism, but authored hundreds of literary reviews as well, most of which were published in the Monthly Review Catalogues, special sections devoted to brief articles. Though literary scholarship has paid little attention to reviews, Barbauld's work at the Monthly Review shows that even brief Catalogue articles were the work of professionals who provided an important service. Study of these articles helps to dispel some of the prejudices about reviewing and literary professionalism. They show that both authors and reviewers regarded literary production as a collective activity, with reviewers playing an active part. Most importantly, they illuminate the evolving role of a woman writer in an increasingly professionalized literary culture. **********