Carter was the daughter of a learned cleric who taught her Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. She was not a precocious child, but she persevered with an industry that affected her health, studying also French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Arabic, astronomy, ancient geography, ancient and modern history, and music, as well as the housewifery that caused Dr. Samuel Johnson to say “My old friend, Mrs. Carter, could make a pudding as well as translate Epictetus from the Greek, and work a handkerchief as well as compose a poem.” She contributed two essays to Johnson's periodical The Rambler and was known and admired by the author Samuel Richardson, who included her "Ode to Wisdom" in his novel Clarissa (1747–48). Her Poems upon Particular Occasions were published in 1738 and Poems on Several Occasions in 1762. It was her translations, however, that ensured her reputation. In 1749 she undertook her most considerable work, a translation, All the Works of Epictetus Which Are Now Extant, published in 1758.