Anna Maria Porter

Ruth Knezevich (University of Minnesota)

Ed. by Emily Rohrbach, University of Durham
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.1.06: English Writing and Culture of the Romantic Period, 1789-1837.
Vol. editors: Daniel Cook (University of Dundee), Nicole Kennedy (University of Newcastle), Daniel Robinson (Widener University), Emily Rohrbach (University of Durham), Sean Seeger (University of Essex)

Dates

Born 1780
Died 1832
Activity 1800-1832

Places

Born in England
Active in England

Activities

Primary

Novelist
Poet

Resources

Anna Maria Porter (1778-1832) was a remarkably prolific Romantic-era novelist and poet. She debuted her earliest commercial work at age 14, Artless Tales, a collection of short romances published in two volumes between 1793 and 1795. With this work of juvenilia, Porter entered into a lifelong professional authorial career, much earlier than many of her better-known contemporaries in fiction. The Porter family was one of storytellers and creatives: Anna Maria’s elder sister Jane Porter (1775-1850) was likewise a novelist; her brother Robert Ker Porter (1777-1842) was a panoramic painter; her brother William Ogilvie Porter (1774-1850) anonymously published a Robinsonade, Sir Edward Seaward’s Narrative (1831), with Jane’s editorial assistance; and the family regularly mingled with London cultural elites. With a life immersed in the literary world, it is perhaps no surprise that Anna Maria Porter would...

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3043 words

Citation: Knezevich, Ruth. "Anna Maria Porter". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 01 December 2025 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=3602, accessed 14 December 2025.]