Helena Coleman

Helena Coleman (April 27, 1860 — December 7, 1953) was a Canadian poet, music teacher, and writer.

Early life

Helena Jane Coleman was born in Newcastle, Ontario, the daughter of the Rev. Francis Coleman, a Methodist minister, and his second wife, Jane C. Gould. Her English-born mother died in 1862. One of her five older half-brothers was geologist Arthur Philemon Coleman. (Her father's first wife, Emmeline Maria Adams Coleman, was a descendant of John Quincy Adams, and sister of educator Mary Electa Adams.)

She attended Ontario Ladies' College in Whitby, Ontario, with further study in Germany.Jean O'Grady
''Margaret Addison: A Biography''
(McGill- Queen's University Press 2001): 48.

Career

Coleman taught piano at Ontario Ladies' College from 1880 to 1892, as head of the music department, while her brothers' aunt Mary Electa Adams was the principal. There she was a friend and colleague of Margaret Addison, who became a dean of the school. Coleman was also a friend of New Zealand writer Edith Joan Lyttelton, during her stays in Canada. Coleman was a mentor to Canadian poet Marjorie Pickthall. Her friendship with fellow Canadian poet Ethelwyn Wetherald was especially intimate.Jennifer Chambers
"'You Woman-Hearted, Poet-Brained Wonder Worker,': The Poetic Dialogue of Love Between Ethelwyn Wetherald and Helena Coleman"
''Canadian Poetry'' 57 (Fall/Winter 2005): 65-85.

Coleman's poems appeared under dozens of pseudonyms (using masculine, feminine, and indeterminate names) in many Canadian and American magazines, including '' Atlantic Monthly'', '' Collier's'', and '' Ladies' Home Journal'', until 1906, when she published '' Songs and Sonnets'' (1906) under her own name, by the Tennyson Club of Toronto. Further poetry collections were '' Marching Men: War Verses'' (1917) and ''Songs'' (1937). Her stories and articles continued to appear under various pseudonyms. Another book by her, '' Sheila and Others'' (1920), was a collection of short stories and bore the byline "Winifred Cotter".Helena Coleman Fonds
E. J. Pratt Library, Special Collections, Victoria University. She was a member of the Canadian Authors Association, and of the University Women's Club of Toronto.

Personal life

Helena Coleman used crutches that she called her "helpers", after surviving polio in childhood. After 1928 she used a wheelchair. Coleman lived most of her life in Toronto with her brother Arthur, and with a niece, Helen Coleman. She died in 1953, aged 93 years, in Toronto.Elcie Pomeroy
"Tribute to Helena Coleman, Poet Native of Village of Newcastle"
''The Canadian Statesman'' (January 14, 1954): 6. Her papers are archived in the E. J. Pratt Library at Victoria University.

References

External links

*

Poems by Coleman
at ''Sonnets.org''.

Coleman
in SFU Digitized Collections, Simon Fraser University, Coll. Canada's Early Women Writers (with a photograph)

{{DEFAULTSORT:Coleman, Helena
1860 births
1953 deaths
Canadian women poets
19th-century Canadian poets
20th-century Canadian poets
Canadian women in World War I
Canadian people of English descent
People from Clarington
Writers from Ontario
People with polio
Canadian music educators
19th-century Canadian women writers
20th-century Canadian women writers
Women music educators