Mrs Delany's Correspondence Reveals a Surprising Strain of Wit
Mrs. Delany's letters from the eighteenth century contain observations that feel startlingly modern, peppered with self-deprecating jokes, sarcastic asides, and sharp commentary on the social elite. Readers approaching her correspondence for the first time might expect the formal politeness of Georgian England, but they discover something far more lively underneath. She writes as though chatting with a close friend across a kitchen table rather than addressing posterity.
Molly Peacock, who spent years immersed in the voluminous archive of Mrs. Delany's letters for her biography "The Paper Garden", discovered that the elderly artist beloved for her paper flower mosaics was also a born comedian. Curious readers can learn about the author to understand how a contemporary poet came to spend years inside an eighteenth-century archive. Peacock has noted that Mrs. Delany's humour sharpened with age rather than fading, an idea that resonates with readers in Adelaide nursing homes, Melbourne universities, and Brisbane community centres who find their own lives improving in laughter as the years pass.
The letters span more than six decades and thousands of pages, yet the wittiest passages cluster in the correspondence she wrote after turning seventy. Her late-life humour takes aim at vanity, illness, fashion, and even her own prolific output of paper botanicals. For Australians accustomed to a culture where senior citizens are expected to fade politely from view, Mrs. Delany's refusal to become a wallflower offers a delightful corrective.
This piece explores the various veins of humour that run through Mrs. Delany's correspondence, the way Molly Peacock frames them, and why modern readers from Perth to Hobart continue to find her letters genuinely funny.
A Cheerful Catalogue of Her Modes of Mirth
Mrs. Delany's humour arrives in several distinct registers, each shaped by the recipient and the occasion. A letter to a niece might contain affectionate teasing, while a letter to a duchess can bristle with polite mockery. Peacock organises these modes with scholarly precision, showing how a single writer could shift between registers with remarkable ease.
| Mode | Audience | Typical Target | Reader Response |
|---|---|---|---|
| Self-deprecation | Close friends and family | Her own age, memory, and paper flower obsession | Fond smile |
| Social satire | Polite society | Fashion, gossip, and aristocratic vanity | Knowing laugh |
| Banter | The Bluestocking circle | Books, ideas, and public figures | Sharp chuckle |
| Playful complaint | Nieces and young companions | Weather, illness, and domestic mishaps | Hearty laugh |
This variety explains why readers in Bondi book clubs, Fremantle libraries, and inner-city Sydney reading groups keep returning to her letters. Each one feels like a small gift tailored to its recipient, yet collectively they build a portrait of a woman whose sense of fun never abandoned her.
Teasing Herself Before Anyone Else Can
Mrs. Delany saved her sharpest pen for herself. She wrote of her "old fingers" trembling over her paper petals, of her eyes becoming "as dull as a tallow dip", and of her tendency to begin new botanical mosaics when she ought to be resting. The self-portrait that emerges is of a woman who refused to take her own celebrity too seriously.
She once described a visit from a royal admirer by saying that she received Her Majesty "in my mobcap and slippers, looking like a witch". The image is funny on its face, but it also signals a woman secure enough in her reputation to welcome her sovereign in her nightwear. Australian readers familiar with the relaxed informality of a Sunday arvo at home will recognise the same easy confidence.
Needling the High and Mighty
When Mrs. Delany turned her attention outward, her wit acquired an edge. She chronicled the endless rounds of social calls, the absurdities of court etiquette, and the fashions that made her contemporaries resemble "flapped pigeons" or "walking flowerpots". Her comments on fashion read like a satire column from a modern weekend magazine, and her observations on the vanity of aristocrats still land with readers who navigate their own social hierarchies in Sydney harbourside apartments or Brisbane riverfront suburbs. The targets have changed, but the impulse to mock remains universal.
Her mockery never became bitter. She treated her ruling acquaintances with affection even when describing their quirks, leaving the satire to do the cutting. For a twenty-first century reader, the result feels closer to a gentle ribbing between old friends than a formal denunciation, an approach that explains why her correspondence has aged so well.
Banter Within the Bluestocking Circle
Mrs. Delany moved easily within the intellectual society that included Elizabeth Montagu, the Duchess of Portland, and other learned ladies of her era. Her letters to these women crackle with shared jokes, Latin puns, and references to books currently in circulation. The humour assumes an educated reader, but the warmth underneath is plain.
These exchanges show that laughter, for Mrs. Delany, was a form of intellectual companionship. She treated her correspondents as equals, ribbing them on their reading habits and gently mocking their literary ambitions. The tone resembles the easy give-and-take of a long-running podcast conversation, with each party building on the last remark. Modern readers searching for the same kind of intellectual play can find it in her pages, and a thoughtful extended review captures how this wit still lands today.
How Molly Peacock Reanimates the Jokes
Molly Peacock's work on Mrs. Delany treats the letters as a literary achievement in their own right, not merely as source material for biography. Her own poetry, with its metrical precision and musical sensibility, shapes how she presents Mrs. Delany's prose. Readers curious about the poetic craft behind the book can explore her metrical form for a sense of the techniques at work.
Peacock selects passages where the humour lands hardest and lets them breathe, surrounding them with commentary that points out the joke without explaining it into the ground. She trusts her readers to catch the wit, much as Mrs. Delany trusted her correspondents to recognise her playful tone. The resulting book reads like a tribute from one wit to another. A reader who finishes it often finds themselves rereading favourite passages aloud, much as one might quote a beloved comedian.
If the wit and warmth of Mrs. Delany's letters appeals, pick up a copy of "The Paper Garden" through your local independent bookshop in Carlton, Newtown, or Subiaco, or borrow it through your public library. Subscribe to the website for upcoming readings, videos, and reflections on Mrs. Delany's life and work, and share this piece with a friend who appreciates the sound of an eighteenth-century woman laughing at herself.