Letitia Elizabeth Landon

The Improvisatrice and Other Poems (Dodo Press) Letitia Elizabeth Landon

Letitia Elizabeth Landon (1802-1838) was an English poet and novelist, better known by her initials L. E. L. In 1809, following her father's loss of property as a result of speculation, the family moved to a country house in East Barnet. An agricultural depression soon followed, and the family moved back to London in 1815, where John Landon made the acquaintance of William Jerdan, editor of the Literary Gazette. Jerdan encouraged Letitia's poetic endeavours, and her first poem was published in the Gazette in 1820 when she was 18. Landon's critical and popular success was almost immediate. She published several volumes of verse and was able to support both herself and her family comfortably on her earnings. In 1831 she published her first novel, Romance and Reality. Her reputation, while high in the 19th century, fell during most of the 20th as literary fashions changed.