| Sumario: | This article examines the representation and publication of women’s suicide notes in eighteenth-century British media, situating them within the period’s literary, legal, and sociopolitical contexts. While suicide was a prominent public and literary theme—reflected in works from Addison’s *Cato* to Richardson’s *Pamela* and *Clarissa*—actual suicide notes, especially those authored by women, were rarely published due to legal and social constraints, including property laws and gendered notions of virtue. The few women’s suicide notes that appeared in newspapers often involved breaches of sexual norms and were framed to emphasize moral condemnation rather than sympathy, contrasting with the more frequent and varied publication of men’s notes. By analyzing these rare texts alongside epistolary novels, the study highlights how women’s suicide notes functioned as fragmented self-narratives caught between attempts at posthumous reputation control and public misinterpretation, revealing the precarious position of suicidal women in eighteenth-century British culture and the limitations imposed on their self-representation.
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