In the wake of his dramatic success, Bertram (1816), and its spectacularly failed successor, Fredolfo (1817), Charles Robert Maturin published his fourth novel, Women; or Pour et Contre (1818). Although it succeeded in its primary objective – meeting the author’s pressing financial need – the novel has often been dismissed, like Maturin’s previous works, as a blatant literary imitation. A critic for the Monthly Review, for instance, argued that Women’s lack of success as well as Maturin’s general literary failure could be attributed to his imitation of Sir Walter Scott:
They [Maturin&r…
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