Cecil Frances Alexander, born Cecil Frances Humphreys on 14 April 1818 and dead on 12 October 1895, became one of the most widely sung and influential hymn writers of the nineteenth century. Her name may be less immediately familiar than the opening lines of her best-known hymns, yet “Once in Royal David’s City,” “All Things Bright and Beautiful,” “There Is a Green Hill Far Away,” and “Jesus Calls Us o’er the Tumult”…
“literary sacrilege—sacrilege against the dead in that which was best and noblest of them”
Neighbourhood:
Children's Verse, Devotional Poets, Hymn Writers, Irish Poets
Emotional landscape: Spirituality, Wonder, Joy
In the twilight of the Victorian era, when the literary world was dominated by towering figures like Tennyson, Browning, and Swinburne, a quieter voice emerged from the shadows of London's Hyde Park Square. Mary Elizabeth Coleridge, born on September 23, 1861, would prove to be one of the most intriguing and underappreciated literary figures of her generation. Her life, spanning forty-six years until her death on Aug…
“The fine arts are all fine ladies, and they cannot replace each other or lay down the law for each other, but they may exchange courtesies now and again?”
Neighbourhood:
Death & Mortality, Decadent Poets, Love Poets, Women Poets
Emotional landscape: Sorrow, Longing, Despair