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Notes which contributed to views expressed in her later writing. Martineau claimed her mother abandoned
her to a wet nurse.
Her ideals on domesticity and the “natural faculty for housewifery” as described in her piece,
Household Education written in 1848, stemmed from her lack of nurture growing up. Martineau’s
mother was the antithesis of the warm and nurturing qualities which Harriet believed to be
necessary for girls at an early age. Martineau’s mother urged all her children to be well-read but
at the same time, opposed female pedantics “with a sharp eye for feminine propriety and good
manners. Her daughters could never be seen in public with a pen in their hand.” Her mother
strictly enforced proper feminine behavior, pushing her daughter to “hold a sewing needle” as
well as the pen.
Martineau began losing her sense of taste and smell, becoming increasingly deaf at a young age
and having to use an ear trumpet. It was the beginning of many health problems in her life. In
1821 she began to write anonymously for the Monthly Repository, a Unitarian periodical, and in
1823 she published Devotional Exercises and Addresses, Prayers and Hymns. Her father’s business
failed in 1829. At 27 years old, Martineau stepped out of feminine propriety in order to earn a
living for her family. Along with her needlework, she began selling her articles to the Monthly
Repository. Her first commissioned volume, Illustrations of Political Economy, was published in
February 1832 and quickly became successful. Martineau agreed to compose monthly volumes for
24 months, each critiquing various political and economic affairs. She developed the multi-volume
work as a fictional tutorial on different political economists such as Malthus, Ricardo, and Bentham
for the general public. It was her first piece to receive widespread acclaim. She continued to write
for the Repository, earning accolades, including three essay prizes from the Unitarian Association.
Her work with the Repository established her as a successful writer.
In 1832 Martineau moved to London. Among her acquaintances were: Henry Hallam, Harriet
Taylor, Alexander Maconochie, Henry Hart Milman, Thomas Malthus, Monckton Milnes, Sydney
Smith, John Stuart Mill, George Eliot, Edward George Bulwer-Lytton, Elizabeth Barrett Browning
and Charles Lyell, as well as Thomas Carlyle. She met Florence Nightingale and Charlotte Brontë
later on in her literary career.
Until 1834 Martineau was occupied with her political economy series as well as a supplemental
series of Illustrations of Taxation. About the same time, she published four stories expressing support
of the Whig Poor Law reforms. These tales (direct, lucid, written without any appearance of effort,
and yet practically effective) display the characteristics of their author’s style. Tory paternalists
reacted by calling her a Malthusian “who deprecates charity and provision for the poor”, while
Radicals opposed her to the same degree. Whig high society fêted her.
In May 1834 Charles Darwin, on his expedition to the Galapagos Islands, received a letter from his
sisters saying that Martineau was “now a great Lion in London, much patronized by Ld. Brougham
who has set her to write stories on the poor Laws” and recommending Poor Laws and Paupers
Illustrated in pamphlet-sized parts. They added that their brother Erasmus “knows her & is a very
great admirer & every body reads her little books & if you have a dull hour you can, and then
throw them overboard, that they may not take up your precious room”.
In 1834, after completing the economic series, Harriet Martineau paid a long visit to the United
States. During this time, she visited with James Madison, the former president, at his home of
Montpelier. She also met numerous abolitionists in Boston and studied the emerging girls’ schools
established for their education. Her support of abolitionism, unpopular in the South, caused
controversy. Her publication, soon after her return, of Society in America (1837) and How to Observe
Morals and Manners (1838), added to the controversy. The two books are considered to have led to
the founding of modern sociology.

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