"Leaves of Ivory": Erasable Writing in Eighteenth-Century Fiction.

This article examines the eighteenth-century practice of writing on ivory tablets, also known as memorandum-books, situating them within the broader history of erasable writing and exploring their cultural, philosophical, and literary significance. Ivory tablets, typically inscribed with graphite and erasable, were common stationery items among the middle classes and carried affective meanings beyond their ephemeral content, reflecting contemporary ideas about memory, creativity, and the mind. The article analyzes their depiction in two late eighteenth-century novels—*Delia, a Pathetic and Interesting Tale* (1790) by Miss/Mrs. Pilkington and Elizabeth Hamilton's *Translations of the Letters of a Hindoo Rajah* (1796)—highlighting how these representations engage with themes of remembering and forgetting, as well as the challenges of female authorship. Drawing on philosophical conceptions of memory, especially John Locke's and John "Walking" Stewart's metaphors of the mind as an erasable writing surface, the article argues that ivory tablets symbolized both the fragility and persistence of memory and creativity in the period.