Augusta Webster was chiefly a dramatic, narrative, and lyric poet of the late nineteenth century. Her many extended dramatic monologues, featuring both male and female speakers, compare favorably with dramatic monologues by Robert Browning, and her melancholy sonnets and renunciatory verse narratives resemble poems by Christina Rossetti. Webster's plays in blank verse explore characters and plots ranging from historical and religious traditions to classical drama and Elizabethan theater; she translated plays by Aeschylus and Euripides into English verse.

Webster also wrote in prose, including an adult novel, a children's fantasy, and many social and political essays concerning women's rights and responsibilities. Her most persistent--and frequently interrelated-- themes in all these various genres were women and marriage, innocence and betrayal, religious faith and doubt. In addition to her work as a writer, Webster found time to campaign for women's suffrage and to serve on the London School Board.

Julia...