Life
1764-1845 [Mrs. Roche; née Regina Maria Dalton]; b. Waterford;
novels incl. The Vicar of Lansdowne (1789), The Maid of the
Hamlet (1793?); sprang to fame with Children of the Abbey (1796),
featuring Amanda and Oscar Fitzalan, two young people in love, robbed
of their inheritance by a forged will; styled to be ‘daughter of
Malvina’ and rivalled to Mrs. Radcliffe’s Mysteries of Udolpho
(1797) in popularity, translated into French, German and Spanish; noticed
by Jane Austen in Emma; also Clermont [1798], satirised
by Austen in Northanger Abbey, and The Nocturnal Visit (1800),
a late novel; issued The Tradition of the Castle, or Scenes in the
Emerald Isle (1824) is in the mould of the Absentee, recommending
that landlords stay at home; d. at her residence on the Mall, Waterford;
Amanda Ros [infra], was romantically self-named after a heroine in Children
of the Abbey. IF DIW DNB MKA RAF FDA ATT OCIL
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Works
The Vicar of Lansdowne, or Country Quarters, a tale (1789); The
Maid of the Hamlet [1793]; The Children of the Abbey, 4 vols.
(London: William Lane 1796, 1797),12o [other editions as infra];
Clermont (1798), and Do., ed., Devendra P. Varma [Northanger
Set of Jane Austen Horrid Novels] (London: Folio Soc., 1968); [Nocturnal
Visit, 1880]; [Alvondown Vicarage, 1807]; The Discarded
Son, or Haunts of the Banditti (1807); The House of Osma and Almeria,
or the Convent of St. Ildefonso (1810); The Monastery of St.
Columb, or, The Atonement (1810); Trecothiek Bower, or the Lady
of the West Country (1813); London Tales, or Reflective
Portraits (1814); The Munster Cottage Boy (1820); The Bridal
of Dunamore, and Lost and Won (1823); The Tradition of the Castle,
or Scenes in the Emerald Isle (1824); The Castle Chapel (1825);
Contrast (1828); The Nun’s Picture (1836; [1834 Camb.
Bibl.]). Reprints, Clermont: A Tale [rep. edn.] (London: Folio
Soc. 1968).
Translations: De Pandrediger von Landsowne (Leipzig: Weygand 1790); Die Erben von Dunreath Abbey (1803), 2 vols.; Der Natbesuch (1802); Les enfans de l’abbaye, trad. par André Morellet (1797, 1801); Oscar y Amanda: Amor y virtud triunfantes ... Verdadera y única refundicion castellana por D. E. Villapando de Cárdenas [adapt.] (1868); Clermont [...] traduits de l’anglais par André Morellet (1799); Contrast (1828); Le Curé de Lansdowne, ou les Garnisons; Imité de l’anglois [sic] de Miss Dalton (1789);
The Children of the Abbey: A Sweet and Interesting Tale, rendered Immortal by its Simple and Beautiful Narrations, by REgina M. Roche (London: William Nicholson & Sons, 20 Warwick Sq., Paternoster Row) [n.d.]), 446pp. [min. format]; see other editions, infra; also Quotations, infra]. Other editions: The Children of the Abbey: A Tale, 4 vols. (London: Minerva-Press for A. K. Newman [1805]); Do. [5th edn.] 2 vols. (Dublin: P. Wogan 1809), 12o.; Do., (Manchester: J. Gleave 1823), 759pp., 10 pls.; The Children of the Abbey: an interesting novel, founded on facts; descriptive of the adventures & misfortunes of Oscar & Amanda Fitzalan, ... who, by a forged will, were for many years unjustly deprived of their legal inheritance (London: W. Mason [?1815-1825], 36pp., pl., 18 cm. [heavily abridged]; Do. 3 vols. (Exeter: J. & B. Williams 1828), 16o.; The Children of the Abbey: A Tale [6th edn.] (London: George Virtue [1836]), 21cm.; Do. [12th edn.; 5 vols.] (Belfast: Joseph Smyth 1836), 15cm.; Do. 1 vol. (London: Daly 1839); The Children of the Abbey: A romance (London: T. Paine [1840]), 212pp., pls., 8o. [pirated edn. of first 24 chaps. with abridgment of the rest]; The Children of the Abbey: A Tale [Notable Novels Ser.] (London: F. Warne [1880-1890?]), 256pp., 22 cm.; also The Children of the Abbey [2nd American Edn.] (NY: I. Riley 1805); Do., [7th edn.] (Philadelphia : C. & A. Conrad & Co. 1812), and Do. (NY: Richard Scott 1816), all rep. in Early American Rep. Ser. (1990). Also, Clermont: A Tale (Philadelphia: J. Conrad & Co. 1802), rep. in Early American Imprints, 2nd Ser., No. 3006.
Criticism
Siobhán Kilfeather, ‘Origins of the Irish Female Gothic’,
in Bullán, I, 2 (Autumn 1994), pp.35-46.
W. J. McCormack, ‘Irish Gothic and After, 1820-1945,’ in Seamus Deane, gen. ed., Field Day Anthology of Irish Literature, (1991), Vol. II, pp.831-854.
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Notes
Dictionary of National Biography entry cites 16 titles,
and says that ‘after Children, she industriously worked at
a similar style of fiction ...’ (entry by D.J. O’D[onoghue]).
Stephen Brown, Ireland in Fiction (Dublin: Maunsel 1919), b.1765-1845, calls Roche a once celebrated novelist; lists, The Children of the Abbey [1798], chiefly concerning earls and marquises; The Munster Cottage Boy (1820), in which a little girl Fidelia is exploited by sundry till she meets her father and discovers herself an heiress; The Bridal of Dunamore (1823), Rosalind, beautiful but haughty and ambitious and the misery she causes to many; The Tradition of the Castle, or Scenes in the Emerald Isle (1824), Donoghue O’Brien is kept apart from his Eveleen Erin, opens with last session of Irish Parliament, and contains nationalist sentiment with a message for absentee landlords to stay at home; The Castle Chapel (1825), a marriage between an O’Neill and one Rose Cormack, a separation compelled by her wife-murdering father Mr Mordaunt, she leaves her fortune; lists The Children of the Abbey as 1798 [err.].
Brian McKenna, Irish Literature (Gale 1978), she achieved enormous popularity with her sentimental novel The Children of the Abbey (1796); O’Donoghue’s DNB entry embraces information in obituary in Gentleman’s Mag., NS 24 (1845), and paragraphs of Notes and Queries, 6th ser. 10 (1884). Other works with Irish settings incl. The Munster Cottage Boy (1820); The Bridal of Dunamore, and Lost and Won (1823); The Tradition of the Castle, or Scenes in the Emerald Isle (1824), and The Castle Chapel (1825).
COPAC lists Bridal of Dunamore: and, Lost and Won (1823); The Castle Chapel: A romantic tale (1825); Do., trans. as La Chapelle du vieux château de Saint-Donlagh, ou les Bandits de Newgate (1825); The children of the Abbey, A Tale, &c. (1796), and Do. [2nd edn.] (1797); The Children of the Abbey: A Romance. (1805); The Children of the Abbey: a tale / By Regina Maria Roche . 1809, 1823, 1825, 1828, 1836, 1843, 1880, 1882, 1890 1990; Children of the Abbey: A Tale (1863, 1870); The Children of the abbey: an interesting novel, Founded on Facts; Descriptive of the Adventures & Misfortunes of Oscar & Amanda Fitzalan, ... Who, by a Forged Will, Were for Many Years Unjustly Deprived of their Legal Inheritance (1825, 1826); The Children of the Abbey. [edn. of first 24 chapss with an abridgment of the remainder(1840), with pls.; Do. trans. as Les enfans de l’abbaye, trad. par André Morellet. Orné de gravures (1797, 1801); Do., trans. as Oscar y Amanda. Amor y virtud triunfantes ... Verdadera y única refundicion castellana por D. E. Villapando de Cárdenas. [adapt.] (1868); Clermont: A Tale (1798); Clermont: A Tale in 4 vols, ed. D. P. Varma (1968; another edn. 1990); Clermont [...] traduits de l’anglais par André Morellet (1799); Contrast (1828); Le Curé de Lansdowne, ou les Garnisons. Imité de l’anglois [sic] de Miss Dalton (1789); The discarded Son: or, Haunt of the Banditti - A tale (1807), and Do. rep edn. (1990); The Houses of Osma and Almeria; or, Convent of St. Ildefonso: A Tale (1810), and Do. rep edn. (1990); London Tales; or, Reflective Portraits (1814); The Maid of the Hamlet: A Tale [2nd edn., enl.] (1800, 1802); The Monastery of St. Columb; or, The Atonement: A Novel (1813, rep. 1990); The Munster Cottage Boy: A Tale (1820); Nocturnal Visit: A Tale, &c. (1800, rep. 1990), and Do., trans. as. La visite nocturne: traduit de l’anglais […] trad. par J. B. J. Breton (1801), and Do. as La Visite nocturne, &c. [Translated by P. L. Lebas.] (1801); The Nun’s Picture: A Tale (1836), another edn. 3 vols. (1843); Rosine et Lydie ou les Dangers de la Coquetterie / par Regina-Maria Roche, auteur des Enfans de l’abbaye, de la Fille du hameau, de Clermont, &c., Traduit de l’anglais par Ch**** (1790) [sic]; The Tradition of the Castle; or, Scenes in the Emerald Isle (1824); Trecothick Bower: or, the Lady of the West Country: A Tale (1814, rep. 1990); The Vicar of Lansdowne; or, Country Quarters: A Tale (1789, 1800, rep. 1990).
Belfast Public Library holds Castle Chapel, 3 vols. (1821); Children of the Abbey, 3 vols. (1835).
Variant dates of birth: Patrick Rafroidi, Irish Literature in
English (Gerrards Cross: Colin Smythe 1980), gives b.?1764. Stephen
Brown, Ireland in Fiction (Dublin: Maunsel 1919), gives 1765 and.
Sister of Oscar: Amanda in Children of the Abbey has a br. Oscar Fitzalan, who loves Adela (‘Oh, who shall paint his transports, after all his sufferings, to be thus rewarded!’, p.441.)
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Princess Grace Irish Library (Monaco)