“If writing were even an effort to me, I should not now be alive, but…” — Amelia Alderson Opie

“If writing were even an effort to me, I should not now be alive, but must have been absolument epuisée; and it might have been inserted in the bills of mortality—"dead of letter-writing, A. Opie.”

Her memorable joke about the extraordinary volume of her correspondence · Letter to Emily Taylor, 1849

Amelia Alderson Opie

About Amelia Alderson Opie

12 November 1769–2 December 1853

Amelia Alderson Opie entered the world on a crisp November day in 1769, born into the bustling heart of Norwich, that ancient cathedral city pulsing with intellectual and radical energy. The only child of Dr. James Alderson, a respected physician known for his generosity to the poor and his progressive views, and his…

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