Memoirs of Emma Courtney

by Mary Hays

"Memoirs of Emma Courtney" by Mary Hays is an epistolary novel published in 1796. Through letters to a young man she calls her son, Emma Courtney recounts her passionate pursuit of a man who cannot marry her, her eventual marriage to another, and the tragedies that follow. This partly autobiographical work scandalized contemporary readers with its frank treatment of female desire and bold questioning of women's place in society, earning Hays recognition as a feminist pioneer.