Katherine Harris Bradley (1846–1914) and Edith Emma Cooper (1862–1913) had a triple relation: aunt and niece, lovers, and collaborative authors of poetry and drama. Their correspondence has been gathered by Sharon Bickle, and I will refer to their letters by their number in that collection. Many of them express their love in a lyrical way, and this is most striking for the year 1885. CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…
John Clare (b. July 13, 1793; d. May 20, 1864) was an English farm labourer and poet. According to his biographer Jonathan Bate, Clare was “the greatest labouring-class poet that England has ever produced. No one has ever written more powerfully of nature, of a rural childhood, and of the alienated and unstable self.” CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…
As it describes Ernest Dowson’s look and behaviour, this strange text has been included in the edition by Flower & Maas of Dowson’s letters. The ghost-like appearance of a repulsive man who seems a living dead carrying mould from his own grave, but who also notices every movement of Dowson and Thurston, seems quite surrealistic. But it is also a dire testimony to the poverty and misery that existed in London at the end of the 19th century.
This text relating events at the end of the 1890’s is undated, but it mentions the 1932 film Cynara directed by King Vidor, it was thus written more than 30 years after the incident. CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…
Ernest Christopher Dowson was born on August 2, 1867 in Lee (now part of Lewisham), in the Kent region of the UK. Throughout his life he suffered from poor health, and he died from tuberculosis and neglect on February 23, 1900, aged 32. He was buried in Ladywell Cemetary. Here is an old picture of his grave, scanned from The Letters of Ernest Dowson (Desmond Flower & Henry Maas, editors): CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…
The English poet and playwright Katharine Harris Bradley was born on October 26 or 27, 1846, the second daughter of Charles Bradley, a tobacco merchant, and Emma Harris. Her father died in 1848. Her elder sister Emma, born in 1835, married John Robert Cooper in 1860. Their first daughter Edith Emma Cooper was born on January 12, 1862. After the birth of her second daughter Amy Katharine in 1865, Emma Cooper became invalid for life. In July 1867, Katharine Bradley and her widowed mother joined the Cooper family, and Katharine took care of the household and her two nieces. Her mother Emma Harris died in 1868, leaving Katharine as legal guardian of Edith and Amy. CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…
Today I introduce an English poet of the late 19th century, who loved little girls and wrote beautiful verse for them. I will devote a few more articles to some of his most moving poems. CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…
La publication des poèmes de Minou Drouet et ensuite l’histoire de son enfance ont toujours donné lieu à des allégations fantastiques, soit sur les supposés pouvoirs paranormaux de la fillette, soit sur l’influence télépathique ou l’emprise hypnotique de sa mère adoptive. Celle-ci d’ailleurs contribua pour une large part à ces spéculations. CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…
Lord Byron’s long poem Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage was published between 1812 and 1818, the first two Cantos in 1812, the third in 1816 and the fourth in 1818, and each edition added some new material. The seventh edition appeared on February 1, 1814, with nine poems added to the twenty already published, and a poem titled “To Ianthe” was prefixed to the First Canto. Written in the autumn of 1812, it was dedicated to Lady Charlotte Harley. CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…
Quand René Julliard publia les premiers poèmes de Minou Drouet en 1955, de nombreux critiques crièrent à la supercherie, affirmant que sa mère adoptive, Claude Drouet, en était le véritable auteur. Ainsi André Breton affirma, invoquant les travaux du psychologue Jean Piaget : « il n’est pas une enfant de cet âge et bien au-delà, qui puisse, par elle-même et à elle seule, écrire ce qu’on prête à Minou Drouet. » Dans un entretien avec André Parinaud, Michèle Perrein, reporter du journal Elle et principale propagandiste de la thèse de l’imposture, usa également d’un pareil argument : CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…
Dans son livre Minou Drouet : ses messages de lumière, Les Éditions Véga (1958), Georgette Corot-Gélas reproduit ce petit mot de Minou, qu’elle présente comme suit : CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…
