Jane Sinnett (née Fry; 8 March 1804 – 14 November 1870)[1] was a British translator, author, and critic.[2] Although less familiar than other 19th-century women writers, she was one among a growing group of female "travellers, translators and journalists during a period when women became increasingly robust participants in the publishing industry."[3][2]
Fry married Dublin-born journalist Edward William Percy Sinnett on 3 September 1825 in Holborn, London.[1] The couple lived in Hamburg, Germany, where between 1826 and 1835, Sinnett gave birth to four children.[1] Both had a strong knowledge of modern languages, and Jane Sinnett contributed to both the Dublin Review and The Athenaeum.[1] Once back in England, Sinnett had another son, and her husband worked on the Morning Herald.[1] The Sinnetts' daughter Sophia (b. 1828) became a painter and art teacher.[1] One of their sons, Frederick (b. 1830), was a journalist and literary critic, and another, Alfred Percy Sinnett, was a journalist and theosophist.[1]
Edward Sinnett died from consumption in May 1844, and Jane Sinnett's literary contributions were then to support herself and her children.[1] She wrote translations and reviews for the publications including the Foreign and Quarterly Review, Bentley’s Miscellany, and regularly for The Westminster Review.[1][2][4][5] Her reputation suffered from George Eliot's description of her as "tiresome" as a contributor to this latter journal, though it has since been argued that it related to Sinnett's failure to respond to proof correction, rather than to her skill as a German scholar.[1] At one stage, Eliot hoped to take over Sinnett's regular 'belles lettres' section of The Westminster Review.[5]
Sinnett became known particularly for her translations of travel literature, including Ida Pfeiffer’s A Lady’s Voyage around the World (the only work by a woman traveller Sinnett ever translated),[2] and works by Évariste Huc and Johann Kohl.[1]
Sinnett died in London on 14 November 1870 and was buried on the western side of Highgate Cemetery.[1]
