Ann Batten Cristall (1769–1848) was an English poet and schoolteacher on friendly terms with Mary Wollstonecraft, Anna Letitia Barbauld and several other writers of her period.
A recent critic has noted in her work "technical virtuosity, masked by claims of metrical irregularity, and a profound questioning of Romantic values.
"[2] Wollstonecraft, along with Barbauld, John Aikin, Mary Hays, Ann Jebb and other literary figures, features in the subscription list for Christall's Poetical Sketches, which was published in 1795 by Joseph Johnson.
[4] Cristall's longer narrative poems and her verse pastoral sketches tend to be melancholy and inclined towards the uncanny or even horrific.
[5] A recent critic discerned in her work "technical virtuosity, masked by claims of metrical irregularity, and a profound questioning of Romantic values.