33 Facts About Mary Lamb

Mary Lamb is best known for the collaboration with her brother Charles on the collection Tales from Shakespeare.

Mary Lamb was confined to mental facilities for most of her remaining life.

Mary Lamb's parents worked for Samuel Salt, a barrister in London, and the family lived above Salt in his home at 2 Crown Office Row in the Inner Temple.

Only two of Mary Lamb's siblings survived: her older brother John Jr.

Mary Lamb learned about literature and writers from her father's stories of the times he had seen Samuel Johnson, who lived nearby, and his visitors.

Mary Lamb remembered seeing, at the age of five, the writer Oliver Goldsmith in the street, and she witnessed David Garrick's acting.

John Mary Lamb continued to work in his old position in the Great Hall of the Inner Temple, where he had waited on Salt, but his wages were not sufficient to keep the lodgings that had been provided without cost by Salt.

Around this time, John Mary Lamb had a stroke, losing most of the use of his left hand.

John's sister Sarah Lamb lived with the family, and her care was spread between Charles and Mary.

The responsibilities and expectations placed on Mary Lamb began to be a serious burden for her toward the end of 1796.

Mary Lamb's father had become senile, her mother required constant care, and her brother John had had an accident, and had moved back in with the family, so that he too could be cared for by her.

Mary Lamb suffered a mental break-down as her mother continued shouting at her.

Mary Lamb took the kitchen knife she had been holding, unsheathed it, and approached her mother, who was sitting down.

Later in the evening Mary Lamb was confined in a local mental facility called Fisher House, in Islington, a place found for her by Charles through a doctor friend of his.

Charles took over responsibility for Mary Lamb after refusing his brother John's suggestion that they have her committed to a public facility.

Charles spent his Sundays and holidays with Mary Lamb, leaving her in the care of his landlords for the rest of the time.

Mary Lamb continued to work as a seamstress, and subscribed to the local lending libraries, as she was a voracious reader throughout her life.

In 1800, after the death of their housekeeper, Mary Lamb had to be confined again for a month.

Mary Lamb patiently watched over Charles when he was drunk, just as he had always watched over her.

Mary Lamb began writing her collection of tales Mrs Leicester's School in 1808, publishing it at the end of the year, but the original title page stated the date as 1809.

In 1810 Charles and Mary Lamb published another collaboration, Poems for Children.

Mary Lamb had difficulties adjusting to middle-class life, as she had to hire and govern servants though she was used to doing household work herself.

In December 1814, Mary Lamb wrote an article titled "On Needle-work", published in the New British Lady's Magazine the following year under the pseudonym Sempronia.

Mary Lamb had a relapse of her mental illness soon after publication of the article.

Mary Lamb spent five happy years with them until finding a position as a governess.

In 1833 Mary Lamb moved to a house for mentally ill people in Edmonton, Middlesex; Charles soon followed.

Mary Lamb lived on at Edmonton until 1842 when she moved with her nurses to a house in London.

Mary Lamb exchanged visits with friends when her mind was strong enough, but her hearing deteriorated in the mid-1840s, making it difficult for her to communicate with others.

Mary Lamb died on 20 May 1847, and she was buried next to her brother in the Edmonton Churchyard in Middlesex.

Mary Lamb was, in fact, a favourite among Charles's literary friends.

Charles and Mary Lamb's story was explored by Dorothy Parker and Ross Evans in their 1949 play The Coast of Illyria.

Mary Lamb is the subject of a 2004 biographical study by British writer Kathy Watson, The Devil Kissed Her, and a 2005 biography by Susan Tyler Hitchcock, Mad Mary Lamb: Lunacy And Murder In Literary London.

An essay on Charles and Mary Lamb, titled "The Unfuzzy Lamb", appeared in Anne Fadiman's book At Large and at Small: Familiar Essays.