Vernon Lee was the pseudonym of the British writer Violet Paget (14 October 1856 – 13 February 1935). She is remembered today primarily for her
supernatural fiction and her work on aesthetics. An early follower of
Walter Pater
Walter Horatio Pater (4 August 1839 – 30 July 1894) was an English essayist, art critic and literary critic, and fiction writer, regarded as one of the great stylists. His first and most often reprinted book, ''Studies in the History of the Re ...
, she wrote over a dozen volumes of essays on art, music, and travel.
Biography
![Violet Paget - Vernon Lee ca 1870](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7d/Violet_Paget_-_Vernon_Lee_ca_1870.jpg)
Violet Paget was born in France on 14 October 1856, at Château St Leonard,
Boulogne, to British expatriate parents, Henry Ferguson Paget and Matilda Lee-Hamilton (née Abadam). Violet Paget was the half-sister of
Eugene Jacob Lee-Hamilton (1845–1907) by her mother's first marriage, and from whose surname she adapted her own
pseudonym
A pseudonym (; ) or alias () is a fictitious name that a person or group assumes for a particular purpose, which differs from their original or true name (orthonym). This also differs from a new name that entirely or legally replaces an individua ...
. Although she primarily wrote for an English readership and made many visits to London, she spent the majority of her life on the continent, particularly in Italy.
![III Villa il Palmerino, Firenze, Italy (2)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b4/III_Villa_il_Palmerino%2C_Firenze%2C_Italy_%282%29.jpg)
Her longest residence was just outside
Florence
Florence ( ; it, Firenze ) is a city in Central Italy and the capital city of the Tuscany Regions of Italy, region. It is the most populated city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants in 2016, and over 1,520,000 in its metropolitan area.Bilan ...
in the Palmerino villa from 1889 until her death at San Gervasio, with a brief interruption during
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
. Her library was left to the British Institute of Florence and can still be inspected by visitors. In Florence she knit lasting friendships with the painter
Telemaco Signorini
Telemaco Signorini (; August 18, 1835 – February 10, 1901) was an Italian artist who belonged to the group known as the Macchiaioli.
Biography
He was born in the Santa Croce quarter of Florence, and showed an early inclination toward the st ...
and the learned
Mario Praz, and she encouraged his love of learning and English literature.
An engaged feminist, she always dressed à la garçonne. During the
First World War
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
, Lee adopted strong
pacifist views, and was a member of the
anti-militarist
Antimilitarism (also spelt anti-militarism) is a doctrine that opposes war, relying heavily on a critical theory of imperialism and was an explicit goal of the First and Second International. Whereas pacifism is the doctrine that disputes (esp ...
organisation, the
Union of Democratic Control
The Union of Democratic Control was a British advocacy group, pressure group formed in 1914 to press for a more responsive foreign policy. While not a pacifism, pacifist organisation, it was opposed to military influence in government.
World War ...
. Scholars speculate that Lee was a lesbian, and had long-term intense relationships with three women,
Mary Robinson
Mary Therese Winifred Robinson ( ga, Máire Mhic Róibín; ; born 21 May 1944) is an Irish politician who was the 7th president of Ireland, serving from December 1990 to September 1997, the first woman to hold this office. Prior to her electi ...
,
Clementina Anstruther-Thomson, and British author,
Amy Levy.
Lee however, in addition to taking on the name Vernon in her private life, resisted being mislabelled as a lesbian by her own peers.
She played the harpsichord and her appreciation of music animates her first major work, ''Studies of the Eighteenth Century in Italy'' (1880). In her preface to the second edition of 1907, she recalled her excitement as a girl when she came across a bundle of 18th-century music. She was so nervous that it wouldn't live up to her expectations that she escaped to the garden and listened rapturously through an open window as her mother worked out the music on the piano. Along with Pater and
John Addington Symonds, she was considered an authority on the Italian
Renaissance
The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history
The history of Europe is traditionally divided into four time periods: prehistoric Europe (prior to about 800 BC), classical antiquity (800 BC to AD ...
, and wrote two works that dealt with it explicitly, ''Euphorion'' (1884) and ''Renaissance Fancies and Studies'' (1895).
Her short fiction explored the themes of haunting and possession. She dedicated her short ghost story ''A Wicked Voice'' to composer
Mary Augusta Wakefield
Mary Augusta Wakefield (19 August 1853 – 16 September 1910) was a British composer, contralto, festival organiser, and writer.
Biography Early life
Wakefield was born in Kendal, where her paternal ancestors had been members of the Quaker ...
in 1887. The most famous stories were collected in ''Hauntings'' (1890) and her story "Prince Alberic and the Snake Lady" (1895) was first printed in the notorious ''
The Yellow Book
''The Yellow Book'' was a British quarterly literary periodical that was published in London from 1894 to 1897. It was published at The Bodley Head Publishing House by Elkin Mathews and John Lane, and later by John Lane alone, and edited by th ...
''. She was instrumental in the introduction of the German concept of 'Einfühlung', or '
empathy
Empathy is the capacity to understand or feel what another person is experiencing from within their frame of reference, that is, the capacity to place oneself in another's position. Definitions of empathy encompass a broad range of social, co ...
' into the study of
aesthetics
Aesthetics, or esthetics, is a branch of philosophy that deals with the nature of beauty and taste, as well as the philosophy of art (its own area of philosophy that comes out of aesthetics). It examines aesthetic values, often expressed t ...
in the English-speaking world.
She developed her own theory of psychological aesthetics in collaboration with her lover,
Kit Anstruther-Thomson, based on previous works by
William James
William James (January 11, 1842 – August 26, 1910) was an American philosopher, historian, and psychologist, and the first educator to offer a psychology course in the United States.
James is considered to be a leading thinker of the lat ...
,
Theodor Lipps
Theodor Lipps (; 28 July 1851 – 17 October 1914) was a German philosopher, famed for his theory regarding aesthetics, creating the framework for the concept of ''Einfühlung'' (empathy)'','' defined as, "projecting oneself onto the object of ...
, and
Karl Groos. She claimed that spectators "empathise" with works of art when they call up memories and associations and cause often unconscious bodily changes in posture and breathing.
She was known for her numerous essays about travel in Italy, France, Germany, and Switzerland, which attempted to capture the psychological effects of places rather than to convey any particular piece of information. Like her friend
Henry James
Henry James ( – ) was an American-British author. He is regarded as a key transitional figure between literary realism and literary modernism, and is considered by many to be among the greatest novelists in the English language. He was the ...
, she wrote critically about the relationship between writers and their audience, pioneering the idea of critical assessment among all the arts as relating to an audience's personal response. She was a proponent of the
Aesthetic movement, and after a lengthy written correspondence met the movement's effective leader,
Walter Pater
Walter Horatio Pater (4 August 1839 – 30 July 1894) was an English essayist, art critic and literary critic, and fiction writer, regarded as one of the great stylists. His first and most often reprinted book, ''Studies in the History of the Re ...
, in England in 1881, just after encountering one of Pater's most famous disciples,
Oscar Wilde.
Her open resistance against World War I and her work ''
Satan the Waster'' led to her being ostracized by the younger generation of scholars and writers. Feminist research led to a rediscovery since the 1990s.
Much of her incoming personal correspondence are preserved in
Somerville College Library
Somerville College Library is the college library of Somerville College, one of the 38 colleges of the University of Oxford. The library is one of the largest college libraries at the University of Oxford and has achieved 100% student satisfacti ...
.
Critical reception
The English writer and translator
Montague Summers
Augustus Montague Summers (10 April 1880 – 10 August 1948) was an English author, clergyman, and teacher. He initially prepared for a career in the Church of England at Oxford and Lichfield, and was ordained as an Anglican deacon in 1908. He ...
described Vernon Lee as "the greatest
..of modern exponents of the supernatural in fiction." Summers also compared Lee's work to that of
M. R. James
Montague Rhodes James (1 August 1862 – 12 June 1936) was an English author, medievalist scholar and provost of King's College, Cambridge (1905–1918), and of Eton College (1918–1936). He was Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambrid ...
.
E. F. Bleiler has claimed that "Lee's stories are really in a category by themselves. Intelligent, amusingly ironic, imaginative, original, they deserve more than the passing attention that they have attracted".
Neil Barron
Richard Neil Barron (23 March 1934 - 5 September 2010) was a science fiction bibliographer and scholar. His training was as a librarian. He is perhaps best known for his book '' Anatomy of Wonder: A Critical Guide to Science Fiction''. He won the ...
described the contents of Lee's collection ''Hauntings'' thus "The stories are powerful and very striking, among the finest of their kind."
Works
* ''Studies of the Eighteenth Century in Italy ''(1880)
* ''A Culture-Ghost; or, Winthrop's Adventure ''(1881) novella published in the April 1881 issue of
Appletons' Journal
''Appletons' Journal'' was an American magazine of literature, science, and arts. Published by D. Appleton & Company and debuting on April 3, 1869, its first editor was Edward L. Youmans, followed by Robert Carter, Oliver Bell Bunce, and Charl ...
.
* ''Belcaro, Being Essays on Sundry Aesthetical Questions ''(1881)
* ''Ottilie: An Eighteenth Century Idyl ''(1883)
* ''The Prince of the Hundred Soups: A Puppet Show in Narrative ''(1883)
* ''The Countess of Albany ''(1884)
* ''Miss Brown ''(1884) novel
* ''Euphorion: Being Studies of the Antique and the Mediaeval in the Renaissance'' (1884)
* ''Baldwin: Being Dialogues on Views and Aspirations ''(1886)
* ''A Phantom Lover: A Fantastic Story ''(1886) novella, also Oke of Okehurst, Alice Oke
* ''Juvenilia, Being a second series of essays on sundry aesthetical questions ''(1887)
* ''Hauntings. Fantastic Stories ''(1890)
* ''Vanitas: Polite Stories ''(1892)
* ''Althea: Dialogues on Aspirations & Duties ''(1894)
* ''Renaissance Fancies And Studies Being A Sequel To Euphorion ''(1895)
* ''Art and Life ''(1896)
* ''Limbo and Other Essays ''(1897)
* ''Genius Loci: Notes on Places ''(1899) travel essays
* ''The Child In The Vatican ''(1900)
* ''In Umbria: A Study of Artistic Personality ''(1901)
* ''Chapelmaster Kreisler A Study of Musical Romanticists ''(1901)
* ''Penelope Brandling: A Tale of the Welsh Coast in the Eighteenth Century ''(1903)
* ''The Legend of Madame Krasinska ''(1903)
* ''Ariadne in Mantua: a Romance in Five Acts ''(1903)
* ''Hortus Vitae: Essays on the Gardening of life ''(1903)
* ''Pope Jacynth – And Other Fantastic Tales ''(1904)
* ''The Enchanted Woods, and Other Essays on the Genius of Places ''(1905) travel essays
* ''Sister Benvenuta and the Christ Child, an eighteenth-century legend ''(1906)
* ''The Spirit of Rome: Leaves from a Diary ''(1906)
* ''Ravenna and Her Ghosts ''(1907)
* ''The Sentimental Traveller . Notes on Places ''(1908) travel essays
* ''Gospels of Anarchy & Other Contemporary Studies ''(1908)
* ''Laurus Nobilis: Chapters on Art and Life ''(1909)
* ''In Praise of Old Gardens ''(1912) with others
* ''Beauty and Ugliness and Other Studies in Psychological Aesthetics ''(1912) with Clementine Anstruther-Thomson
* ''Vital Lies: Studies of Some Varieties of Recent Obscurantism ''(1912)
* ''The Beautiful. An Introduction to Psychological Aesthetics ''(1913)
* ''The Tower of the Mirrors and Other Essays on the Spirit of Places ''(1914) travel essays
* ''Louis Norbert. A Twofold Romance ''(1914) novel
* ''The Ballet of the Nations. A Present-Day Morality ''(1915) illustrations by
Maxwell Armfield
Maxwell Ashby Armfield (5 October 1881 – 23 January 1972) was an English artist, illustrator and writer.
Life
Born to a Quaker family in Ringwood, Hampshire, Armfield was educated at Sidcot School and at Leighton Park School. In 1887 he was ...
* ''Satan the Waster: A Philosophic War Trilogy ''(1920)
* ''The Handling of Words and Other Studies in Literary Psychology ''(1923)
* ''Proteus or The Future Of Intelligence ''(1925)
* ''The Golden Keys and Other Essays on the Genius Loci ''(1925) travel essays
* ''The Poet's Eye, Notes on Some Differences Between Verse and Prose ''(Hogarth Press, 1926)
* ''For Maurice. Five Unlikely Stories ''(1927)
* ''Music and its Lovers: An Empirical Study of Emotional and Imaginative Responses to Music ''(1932)
Editions published posthumously
* ''Snake Lady and Other Stories ''(1954)
* ''Supernatural Tales ''(1955)
* ''The Virgin of the Seven Daggers – And Other Chilling Tales of Mystery and Imagination ''(1962)
Bilingual editions
* ''Unsere Liebe Frau der Sieben Dolche / The Virgin of the Seven Daggers'', bilingual (German/English) edition. Calambac Verlag, Saarbrücken 2017. .
Notes and references
Further reading
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External links
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Essays by Vernon Lee at Quotidiana.org*
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Play ''Ariadne in Mantua'' at Great War Theatre website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Lee, Vernon
1856 births
1935 deaths
British essayists
British poets
British women novelists
English feminists
English pacifists
English horror writers
Ghost story writers
English lesbian writers
Pseudonymous women writers
Victorian novelists
Victorian women writers
British women essayists
British expatriates in Italy
English LGBT poets
English LGBT novelists
People from Boulogne-sur-Mer
Women horror writers
British women poets
19th-century British women writers
20th-century British women writers
19th-century British writers
20th-century British writers
Weird fiction writers
19th-century pseudonymous writers
20th-century pseudonymous writers