Page from manuscript of Cecilia

Frances Burney was an English writer best known for sprawling satirical novels featuring strong female protagonists, who were a relative rarity in the 18th century. Her second novel, a comedy of manners titled Cecilia, follows the young eponymous heroine as she navigates London society and falls in love.



Burney edited her work heavily. Often she lightly struck through passages with her pen, or rearranged text by cutting and pinning slips of paper to the manuscript. On this page, however, she took a heavier hand, expurgating 12 lines of text that are surrounded by a masquerade scene. The scholar Hilary Havens recently recovered the sensational passage that Burney expunged: an unusual description of satanic rites, written partially in an approximation of the Coptic language.