Isabella Whitney

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Isabella Whitney (b. 1540s?) is the earliest identified woman to have published secular poetry in the English language.

[edit] Biography

Most of what we "know" of Isabella Whitney's life is based on speculation from her poetry, which was often addressed to family members, and letters included in A Sweet Nosgay. Her brother, Geoffrey Whitney, was an emblem book writer in London, and she had at least four other siblings.

She was born in Cheshire, probably from a middle class background (she was literate at a time when the working class, and especially women, were not educated). However in London she worked as a servant - as a lady's companion to an upper-class or aristocratic family. Unfortunately she lost this position, possibly through slander and gossip against her (she writes of ill health and 'malice' in a letter to a friend). Illness kept her indoors, and she began to write.

Isabella Whitney wrote out of financial necessity, and published two short collections of poems: The copy of a letter lately written in meeter, by a yonge Gentilwoman: to her unconstant lover (1567), and A Sweet Nosgay, Or Pleasant Posye: contayning a hundred and ten Phylosophicall Flowers (1573). Both were printed in the form of cheap pamphlets by the London printer Richard Jones.

[edit] Works

The Copy of a Letter, Lately Written in Meter by a Young Gentlewoman: to her Unconstant Lover (1567)
A Sweet Nosegay or Pleasant Posy: Containing a Hundred and Ten Philosophical Flowers (1573)