Editing Frances Brooke (section)

==Legacy==
Brooke is widely seen by literary historians and critics as the first Canadian novelist for writing her 1769 work ''The History of Emily Montague''.<ref name=":0">{{Cite journal |date=October 1996 |title=Brooke, Frances [Moore] |journal=Benet's Reader's Encyclopedia |pages=138 |via=Literary Reference Center Plus}}</ref> Her literary reception is based mostly on this publication. It was popular among scholars after its recovery, with more than a dozen scholarly articles written on its subject matter by 2004.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Arch |first=Stephen Carl |date=2004 |title=Frances Brooke's 'Circle of Friends': The Limits of Epistolarity in the History of Emily Montague |journal=Early American Literature |volume=39 |issue=3 |pages=465–485|doi=10.1353/eal.2005.0001 |s2cid=161347668}}</ref> Modern paperback reprints include a definitive scholarly edition.<ref>{{Cite book |title=The History of Emily Montague |last=Brooke |first=Frances |publisher=Carleton University Press for the Centre for Editing Early Canadian Texts |year=1985}}</ref> Critics of Brooke have studied themes present in ''Emily Montague,'' such as applying free-trade imperialism to 18th-century Canada,<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Binhammer |first=katherine |date=2011 |title=The Failure of Trade's Empire in the History of Emily Montague |journal=Eighteenth Century Fiction |volume=23 |issue=2 |pages=295–319 |doi=10.3138/ecf.23.2.295}}</ref> proto-feminism,<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Wyett |first=Jodi L.|date=2003 |title='No Place Where Women Are of Such Importance': Female Friendship, Empire, and Utopia in the History of Emily Montague |journal=Eighteenth-Century Fiction |volume=1 |pages=33–57|doi=10.1353/ecf.2003.0007 |s2cid=162125458}}</ref> and displacing the French Catholic threat in British Columbian colonies.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Vanek |first=Morgan |date=2016 |title='Set the Winter at Defiance': Emily Montague's Weather Reports and Political Sensibility |journal=Eighteenth-Century Fiction |volume=28 |issue=3 |pages=447–470 |doi=10.3138/ecf.28.3.447 |s2cid=155722933}}</ref>

While the purpose and material of ''Emily Montague'' are often debated among critics, its reception as a work is largely neutral to negative. Recent critics such as Dermot McCarthy concede that "Brooke's inability to imagine her ambivalence... is understandable given her time and background.... However, her failure should not be endorsed."<ref>{{Cite journal |last=McCarthy |first=Dermot |date=1994 |title=Sisters under the Mink: The Correspondent Fear in the History of Emily Montague |journal=Essays on Canadian Writing |volume=52 |pages=340–357}}</ref> Desmond Pacey, in his ''Essays in Canadian Criticism'' writes that "''Emily Montague'''s artistic shortcomings are obvious: the plot is thin, conventional, repetitive, and poorly integrated with the informative sections of the book; the style is generally stilted and monotonous; the characters, with one or two exceptions, are traditional in conception and deficient in life; the whole performance is heavily didactic and sentimental."<ref>{{Cite book |title=Essays in Canadian Criticism |last=Pacey |first=Desmond |publisher=Ryerson |year=1969 |location=Toronto |pages=143–150}}</ref> Juliet McMaster cites ''Emily Montague'' as a source of inspiration and parody for Jane Austen's ''[[Love and Freindship]]'', but states that overall, "''Emily Montague'' is no mean literary achievement."<ref>{{Cite journal |last=McMaster |first=Juliet |date=April 1999 |title=Young Jane Austen and the First Canadian Novel: From Emily Montague to "Amelia Webster" and Love and Freindship |journal=Eighteenth-Century Fiction |volume=11 |issue=3 |pages=339–346 |doi=10.1353/ecf.1999.0022 |s2cid=161534480}}</ref> Even in its own time, views divided on its value. The ''Monthly Review'' in its September 1769 issue wrote that its "frost pieces... decorate a short story which has nothing extraordinary in it."<ref>{{Cite journal |date=September 1769 |title=Review of The History of Emily Montague, by Frances Brooke |journal=Monthly Review |volume=41 |pages=231–232}}</ref> While Brooke is promoted as a Canadian novelist, Benet's ''Reader's Encyclopedia'' entry notes how "Brooke's work was based on English models and had no perceptible effect on Canadian literature."<ref name=":0"/>

Other Brooke works, such as her 1777 novel ''The Excursion'', have received scholarly interest for their pastoral traditions<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Schellenberg |first=Betty |date=2005 |title=The Politicized Pastoral of Frances Brooke |journal=The Professionalization of Women Writers in Eighteenth-Century Britain |pages=45–75 |doi=10.1017/CBO9780511597633.004 |isbn=9780521850605}}</ref> and their political satire against the English theatre industry of the 18th century,<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Charles |first=Katherine G. |date=December 1, 2014 |title=Staging Sociability in the Excursion: Frances Brooke, David Garrick, and the King's Theatre Coterie |journal=Eighteenth-Century Fiction |volume=27 |issue= 2 |pages=257–284 |doi=10.3138/ecf.27.2.257|s2cid=154950262}}</ref> while some of her works such as her 1781 play ''The Siege of Sinopoe'' have close to no reception. Brooke's personal life is the subject of a number of scholarly journals, mostly on her relations with actors [[David Garrick]] and [[Mary Ann Yates]].<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Berland |first=K.J.H. |date=1991 |title=Frances Brooke and David Garrick |journal=Studies in Eighteenth-Century Culture |volume=20 |issue=1 |pages=217–230 |doi=10.1353/sec.2010.0132 |s2cid=144196262}}</ref> Brooke herself was the subject of her own monograph,<ref>{{Cite book |title=An Odd Attempt in a Woman: The Literary Life of Frances Brooke |last=McMullen |first=Lorraine |publisher=British Columbia Press |year=1983 |location=Vancouver}}</ref> and in recent years has gained popularity as the "destroyer of English (not literally)" after an online article published by the University of Pennsylvania, which regards Brooke as being used in the earliest Oxford English Dictionary citation of the hyperbolic use of the word "literally" to mean "figuratively".<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=5914 |title=Frances Brooke, destroyer of English (not literally) |last=Zimmer |first=Ben |date=August 15, 2013 |website=University of Pennsylvania Language Log |access-date=August 8, 2017}}</ref>

In 1985, the International Astronomical Union's Working Group for Planetary System Nomenclature, approving 337 names for features on the surface of Venus, honoured Brooke by naming a crater after her.<ref>{{Cite book |editor-last=Swings |editor-first=Jean-Pierre |date=1986 |title=Proceedings of the Nineteenth General Assembly, Delhi, 1985 |publisher=International Astronomical Union |volume=19B |pages=342}}</ref>