SHELLEY, Mary Wollstonecraft (1797-1851). Six autograph letters signed (‘Mary Shelley’ and 'M Shelley') to Bartolomeo Cini, Rome, Sorrento [and Putney], [1843 and later].

SHELLEY, Mary Wollstonecraft (1797-1851). Six autograph letters signed (‘Mary Shelley’ and 'M Shelley') to Bartolomeo Cini, Rome, Sorrento [and Putney], [1843 and later].

In Italian. Six letters, 16 pages in total, various sizes (113 x 91 to 214 x 138mm), on bifolia.

A series of letters by Mary Shelley, written in Italian to the Tuscan nobleman Bartolomeo Cini, asking after her late husband’s letters, discussing their mutual acquaintances and referring to her dislike of travelling by sea in bad weather. The correspondence opens with a request for information on the fate of her husband’s letters written to Cini’s mother-in-law – ‘As you well know, my husband was very close to Nerina’s mother […] So I would like to know if the papers and letters of this esteemed lady still exist, because I would love to read my husband’s letters. I was told that after her sad death all the papers had been burnt’ – a subject which Shelley would prefer not to broach with Nerina [Cini’s wife] for fear of evoking painful memories; the missives that follow contain thanks for the letters [of Percy Shelley] sent by Cini, she apologises for the inconvenience deriving from Tozzetti’s tiresome business (‘I am glad that he did not obtain what he was looking for – he deserved nothing’, 6 April 1843), promises to honour a debt to Cini, sends fond regards to Laura [Cini’s sister-in-law], reports on her progress through Italy with [Andrew Alexander] Knox and Percy [Florence], along with her planned departure: ‘I hope that we will have good weather. I very much dislike travelling in bad weather’, 10 July 1843). The final letter, perhaps written from Shelley’s home in Putney, speaks of arranging a reunion of Tuscan friends including ‘Chiara’ [possibly Claire Clairmont].

Mary Shelly first wrote to the Tuscan politician and railway financier Bartolomeo Cini (1809-1877) in the hope of recovering letters sent by her late husband, Percy Bysshe Shelley, to his mother-in-law, the Irish hostess and writer Margaret King (1773–1835). As a child in Ireland, Margaret King had been a favoured pupil of Mary’s mother, Mary Wollstonecraft; when Mary and her husband Percy came to travel in Italy, along with her step-sister Claire Clairmont, they relied upon King for support and advice, the young poet Percy in particular. Margaret was then living in Pisa with George William Tighe and their daughters Lauretta and Nerina; Nerina later married Bartolomeo Cini. Mary Shelley travelled in Italy with her son Percy Florence between 1840 and 1843 – journeys she described in Rambles in Germany and Italy, 1844 – accompanied by a Cambridge friend of her son’s, Andrew Alexander Knox.