A Simple Story (1791) by Elizabeth Inchbald is the first novel written by an English Catholic with Catholic characters, but despite being praised by authors from Wilkie Collins to Lytton Strachey, the book has repeatedly slipped into near oblivion.
The philosopher and women’s rights pioneer Mary Wollstonecraft lauded A Simple Story as “truly dramatic constellation of splendid characters”.
In 1885, Fr Peter Haythornthwaite wrote to the Dublin Review to protest the neglect of Inchbald, a “woman of original genius, striking character and a devout Catholic”. One year later, Wilkie Collins called
A Simple Story a “rare triumph”.
