Eastlake, Elizabeth, Lady (Rigby)

Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature by John W. Cousin

(1809-1893)


dau. of Dr. Edward Rigby of Norwich, a writer on medical and agricultural subjects, spent her earlier life on the Continent and in Edin. In 1849 she m. Sir Charles L. Eastlake, the famous painter, and Pres. of the Royal Academy. Her first work was Letters from the Shores of the Baltic (1841). From 1842 she was a frequent contributor to the Quarterly Review, in which she wrote a very bitter criticism of Jane Eyre. She also wrote various books on art, and Lives of her husband, of Mrs. Grote, and of Gibson the sculptor, and was a leader in society.

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