The Forgotten Godmother of Economic Literature

Maria Edgeworth, a celebrated Regency-era novelist, was an early champion of Adam Smith's The Wealth of Nations, embedding economic concepts into her popular stories to educate the public. Despite her fame and influence, she remains largely absent from the history of economic thought. Biographer Jeanna Smialek explains how Edgeworth engaged in friendly debates with Thomas Malthus and David Ricardo, and how the Irish potato famine reshaped the era's intellectual landscape.