Rosa Nouchette Carey
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Rosa Nouchette Carey (27 September 1840 – 9 July 1909) was an English children's writer and popular novelist, whose works reflected the values of her time and were thought of as wholesome for girls. However, they are "not entirely bereft of grit and realism."''Women Writers, Part 1, A–F'' Catalogue CCXXV (London: Jarndyce Antiquarian Booksellers, 2017), Item 360 ff.


Life

Born in
Stratford-le-Bow Bow () is an area of East London within the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. It is primarily a built-up and mostly residential area and is east of Charing Cross. It was in the traditional county of Middlesex but became part of the County of ...
, Rosa was the sixth of the seven children of William Henry Carey (died 1867), shipbroker, and his wife, Maria Jane (died 1870), daughter of Edward J. Wooddill. She was brought up in London at Tryons Road,
Hackney, Middlesex Hackney Central is a sub-district of Hackney in the London Borough of Hackney in London, England and is four miles (6.4 km) northeast of Charing Cross. The Hackney Central area is focused on Mare Street and the retail areas to the north ...
and in South Hampstead. She was educated at home and at the Ladies' Institute, St John's Wood, where she was a contemporary and friend of the German-born poet
Mathilde Blind Mathilde Blind (born Mathilda Cohen; 21 March 1841 in Mannheim, Germany – 26 November 1896, in London), was a German-born English poet, fiction writer, biographer, essayist and critic. In the early 1870s she emerged as a pioneering female aest ...
(1841–1896). Her first novel, ''Nellie's Memories'' (1868), arose out of stories she had told to her younger sister. As her writing career expanded after the death of her parents, so did her family responsibilities. When her mother died in 1870, she and an unmarried sister went to keep house for a widowed brother and look after his children. Later the sister married and the brother died, leaving Carey in sole charge of the children. Among her close friends was the prolific novelist Mrs Henry Wood. The poet Helen Marion Burnside came to live with her in about 1875, and Carey's sister returned to keep house for them after her husband died. Carey died of lung cancer at her home in Putney, London on 19 July 1909 and was buried in Hampstead Cemetery.


Writings

''Nellie's Memories'' appears to have sold over 50,000 copies. Most of her 33 three-decker novels told pious, domestic stories, thought of as wholesome fiction for girls in the last third of the 19th century. Often sentimental, they reflect the values of the period, "treating housekeeping and woman's caring role as real work." However, her 1869 novel ''Wee Wifie'' features vitriol-throwing, opium addiction, and hereditary insanity. Also notable are Carey's sympathetic portrayals of women suffering from mental illness. Several novels suggest mental health can be ensured by "control of the will", as advocated by the psychiatrist Henry Maudsley. One of her books, ''Heriot's Choice'' (1879), was serialised in Charlotte M. Yonge's magazine ''
The Monthly Packet ''The Monthly Packet'' was an English magazine published between 1851 and 1899, founded by members of the Oxford Movement to counter Anglo-Catholic extremism. It was strongly influenced by its first editor, the novelist Charlotte Mary Yonge, with a ...
'' and another, ''Mistress of Brae Farm'' (1896) in ''
Argosy Argosy or The Argosy may refer to: Arts, entertainment and media * ''Argosy'' (magazine), an American pulp magazine 1882–1978 and revived 1990–1994, 2004–2006 * ''Argosy'' (UK magazine), three British magazines * Argosy spaceship in ''Escap ...
''. She was a less intellectual, religious and humorous writer than Yonge, but placed her characters shrewdly in the populous urban, book-buying middle class. Carey was on the staff of the ''
Girl's Own Paper ''The Girl's Own Paper'' (''G.O.P.'') was a British story paper catering to girls and young women, published from 1880 until 1956. Publishing history The first weekly number of ''The Girl's Own Paper'' appeared on 3 January 1880. As with its ...
'', for which she wrote eight serials. She also wrote a laudatory biographical collection of ''Twelve Notable Good Women of the XIXth Century'' (1899), including Queen Victoria and the
Quaker Quakers are people who belong to a historically Protestant Christian set of Christian denomination, denominations known formally as the Religious Society of Friends. Members of these movements ("theFriends") are generally united by a belie ...
philanthropist and reformer Elizabeth Fry. The London publisher
Macmillan MacMillan, Macmillan, McMillen or McMillan may refer to: People * McMillan (surname) * Clan MacMillan, a Highland Scottish clan * Harold Macmillan, British statesman and politician * James MacMillan, Scottish composer * William Duncan MacMillan ...
had 18 novels by Carey on their Three-and-Sixpenny Library list in 1902. Some of her books were reprinted by the Religious Tract Society in the 1920s. There have been doubts about whether Carey was the author of four thrillers published under the pseudonym Le Voleur in the 1890s.


Published works

Carey was a prolific author; the list of her works on the British Library catalogue reflects a publishing rate of at least a book a year. *''Nellie's Memories: A Domestic Story'' (London: Tinsley Bros., 1868) *''Wee Wifie'' (London, 1869) *''Wooed and Married'' (London: Tinsley Bros., 1875) *''Heriot's Choice'' (London: R. Bentley & Son, 1879) *''Queenie's Whim'' (London: R. Bentley & Son, 1881) *''Not like Other Girls'' (London: R. Bentley & Son, 1884) *''Robert Ord's Atonement'' (London: R. Bentley & Son, 1884) *''For Lilias'' (London: R. Bentley & Son, 1885) *''Uncle Max'' (London: R. Bentley & Son, 1887) *''Esther'' (London: The Religious Tract Society, 1887) *''Only the Governess'' (London: R. Bentley & Son, 1888) *''Aunt Diana'' (London: The Religious Tract Society, 1888) *''The Search for Basil Lyndhurst'' (London: R. Bentley & Son, 1889. Reissued as ''Basil Lyndhurst'', 1895) *''Merle's Crusade'' (London: The Religious Tract Society, 1889) *''Lover or Friend?'' (London: R. Bentley & Son, 1890) *''Our Bessie'' (London: The Religious Tract Society, 1891) *''Averil'' (London: The Religious Tract Society, 1891) *''Sir Godfrey's Grand-daughters'' (London: R. Bentley & Son, 1892) *''But Men Must Work'' (London: R. Bentley & Son, 1892) *''Mrs. Romney'' (London: R. Bentley & Son, 1894) *''Little Miss Muffet'' (London: The Religious Tract Society, 1894) *''Tiney's Birthday Gift'' (1894) *''By Order of the Brotherhood'' (as Le Voleur. London: Jarrold, 1895) *My Little Boy Blue (Fleming H. Revell Company) 1895 *''The Mistress of Brae Farm'' (London: R. Bentley & Son, 1896) *''Other People's Lives'' (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1897) *''The Old, Old Story'' (London: R. Bentley & Son, 1897) *''Doctor Luttrell's First Patient'' (London: Hutchinson & Co., 1897) *''For the Love of a Bedouin Maid'' (as Le Voleur, London: Hutchinson & Co., 1897) *''Mollie's Prince'' (London: Hutchinson & Co., 1898) *''Barbara Heathcote's Trial'' (London, 1898) *''Cousin Mona'' (London: The Religious Tract Society, 1897) *''Twelve Notable Good Women of the XIX Century'' (Hutchinson, 1899) *''Marquise'' (1899) *''My Lady Frivol'' (London: Hutchinson & Co., 1899) *''In the Tsar's Dominions'' (as Le Voleur, London, 1899) *''Rue with a Difference'' (London: Macmillan & Co., 1900) *''Life's Trivial Round'' (London: Hutchinson & Co., 1900) *''The Clumpington Mystery'' (as Le Voleur, London, 1900) *''Herb of Grace'' (London: Macmillan & Co., 1901) *''The Highway of Fate'' (London: Macmillan & Co., 1902) *''Mary St. John'' (London: Macmillan & Co., 1903) *''Effie's Little Mother'' (London: R. Tuck & Sons, 1903) *''At the Moorings'' (London: Macmillan & Co., 1904) *''The Household of Peter'' (London: Macmillan & Co., 1905) *''Esther Cameron's Story'' (London: The Religious Tract Society, 1906 *''No Friend Like a Sister'' (London: Macmillan & Co., 1906) *''The Angel of Forgiveness'' (London: Macmillan & Co., 1907) *''The Sunny Side of the Hill'' (London: Macmillan & Co., 1908) *''The Key of the Unknown'' (London: Macmillan & Co., 1909) *''A Passage Perilous'' (London: Hodder & Stoughton, .d.


See also


References


External links and written sources

* * * *Website biography
Retrieved 31 May 2011
Also bibliography

*''The New York Times'' notice of Rosa Nouchette Carey's death
Retrieved 31 May 2012.
*Black, Helen C.: ''Notable Women Authors of the Day: Biographical Sketches'' (Glasgow: Davie Bryce & Sons, 1893) *Crisp, Jane
''Rosa Nouchette Carey (1840–1909). A Bibliography'' Victorian Fiction Research Guides 16 (St Lucia, Queensland: University of Queensland, 1989)
*Hartnell, Elaine: ''Gender, Religion and Domesticity in the Novels of Rosa Nouchette Carey'' (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2000). *Shattock, J.: ''The Oxford Guide to British Women Writers'' (Oxford: OUP, 1993).
American Publishers' Trade Bindings: Rosa Nouchette Carey
{{DEFAULTSORT:Carey, Rosa Nouchette 1840 births 1909 deaths 19th-century English women writers English women novelists Victorian novelists Victorian women writers Writers from London People from Bow, London English children's writers 19th-century English novelists Deaths from lung cancer in England 20th-century English novelists 20th-century English women writers