Mary Bryan

Mary Bryan (1780–1838) was an English Romantic poet and novelist. Her works include the novel Longhollow; a Country Tale (1829) and the poetry collection Sonnets and Metrical Tales (1815). Bryan was also a correspondent of William Wordsworth and Walter Scott. Life Early life Mary Bryan was born Mary Lagdon on June 15, 1780 in North Petherton in Somerset, England. Her parents were Edmund Langdon and Mary Ballam. Bryan was the eldest child of her family and had three younger siblings, Anna, Julia, and John Ballam, who appear in some of her poems. First marriage On Mary 30, 1804, Bryan married Edward Bryan (1779–1814) in Wells, Somerset. Edward Bryan set up a printing and stationary shop in Bristol around the year 1809 and died in 1814. After Edward Bryan's death, the printing firm was operated by Mary Bryan's father under the name Mary Bryan & Co, though the business never became a financial success. Mary and Edward Bryan had six children together. Mary Bryan's surviving letters indicate that Edward may have prohibited her from publishing her writing; she published her first book, Sonnets and Metrical Tales, in 1815, a year after his death.