Radclyffe Hall (1880 – 1943) was born in Hampshire, England and self-identified as a “congenital invert.” In the early 20th century this was her best (and perhaps only) option for describing what she described as a man’s soul born into a woman’s body, and vice versa.
She wrote about elements that were present in her life; for example, wealthy upper-class lifestyle, English culture and her attraction to women. Hall frequently dressed in masculine garb and called herself John.
Hall’s most famous work,The Well of Loneliness (1928) draws on her own life, as it features a lesbian from an upper class family in England. The main character, Stephen Gordon, lives with her partner, Mary Llewellyn. Read More→
George Eliot (1819 –1880) was the masculine pen name of Mary Ann Evans, the esteemed British author of Victorian-era novels. Her writing was political and creative, inspired by art, psychology, and current events.
Her novels were critically acclaimed and sold well upon publication. From Adam Bede (1859) through Daniel Deronda (1876), George Eliot was at her most productive.
These books, along with The Mill on the Floss, Silas Marner, Romola, and Middlemarch are considered some of the finest and most important literary works in British literature. Read More→
Elizabeth Gaskell (1810 – 1865) incorporated three major social themes for her time including the upheaval of class boundaries, the industrialization of England, and women’s issues in the Victorian era. Following is a selection of quotes from Elizabeth Gaskell’s highly-regarded novels, with special emphasis on North and South.
Mrs. Gaskell, as she was known in the literary world, grew up in England with her aunt who encouraged her reading and writing interests. Her work was first published in Household Words and Blackwood’s magazine, among others once she began to make literary connections with other well-known authors.
North and South, Cranford, Wives and Daughters, and Mary Barton still rank among the finest novels in English literature, even though Mrs. Gaskell doesn’t receive as much attention as do some of her British contemporaries to this day.
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Audre Lorde (1934 – 1992), a self-identified “black lesbian, mother, warrior, poet,” used her many talents as a writer to express ideas about intersecting oppressions, especially those faced by women.
As society moved toward the anti-war, feminist, and civil rights movements, especially in the 1970s, she explored more political themes in her poetry and essays. There are many reasons to love Audre Lorde and keep her legacy alive. Here are just a few: Read More→
Lorraine Hansberry was best known for A Raisin in the Sun (1959), the first play written by a Black woman to be staged on Broadway. The following quotes by Lorraine Hansberry demonstrate her exceptional talent.
Hansberry won the New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award and numerous other honors for this play, which has been made twice into feature films and continues to be staged around the world.
Among her other well-known works were To Be Young, Gifted and Black (both a stage play and a book) and Les Blancs. She also wrote political essays for magazines and journals, and was active in the pursuit of race and gender equality. She died prematurely of cancer at age 34, leaving a lasting legacy in the theatrical world.
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Betty MacDonald (March 26, 1907 – February 7, 1958) was an American author of humorous memoirs and children’s books, born Anne Elizabeth Campbell Bard in Boulder, Colorado.
Her father was a mining engineer who moved the family around frequently before finally settling in Seattle, Washington in 1916.
At age twenty, Betty married Robert Eugene Heskett. It was 1927, and the couple made their home on a chicken farm in Chimacum Valley, part of Washington State’s Olympic Peninsula. The marriage ended just three years later when Betty left her husband and returned to Seattle in 1931. Read More→
Elizabeth Barrett Browning is perhaps best known for Sonnet 43. It opens with the infamously sappy line: “How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.” Spoiler alert: there are ten ways.
Browning enjoyed much popular and critical success in her life, which continued for some time after her death in 1861, at age 55. Her popularity declined over much of the twentieth century, until interest in it was revived by new biographies and scholarly editions of her works.
Though celebrated for ‘Sonnet 43’, which cold-hearted cynics like myself see as trite and kitschy, the poem “A Dead Rose” (see below) is perhaps more indicative of the talent that made her famous. Read More→
Dorothy Canfield Fisher (1879 – 1958) was a teacher, novelist, nonfiction writer, social activist, and traveler. Coming from a cosmopolitan background of professors, she was able to obtain a college education that was enviable for a woman of her time. Here is presented selection of timeless quotes by Dorothy Canfield Fisher on life and love.
Fisher’s best-known work is Understood Betsy (1917), a children’s book; she was also known in her time for The Bed-Quilt and other short stories and novels that had a quietly subversive edge to them.
She earned her doctorate in Romance Languages at the Sorbonne. Upon the outbreak of World War I, Fisher and her husband and children left their farm in Vermont to help in the French war effort. Read More→
