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Felicia Hemans

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Hemans

Felicia Hemans (1793-1835). Courtesy East Carolina University.

Felicia Hemans
Born 25 September 1793
Liverpool, England
Died 16 May 1835
Dublin, Ireland
Occupation Poet
Nationality United Kingdom English

Felicia Dorothea Hemans (25 September 1793 - 16 May 1835) was an English poet.

Life[]

Overview[]

Hemans was the daughter of a Liverpool merchant, who, owing to reverses, retired to North Wales. While yet little more than a child she published her 1st poems, the reception of which was not encouraging. In the same year, 1808, a further publication appeared which drew a letter from Shelley. Her 1st important work, The Domestic Affections, appeared in 1812, in which year she was married to Captain Hemans, an Irish officer. The union, however, was not a happy one, and her husband practically deserted her and her 5 sons in 1818. Her literary activity was continued during the whole of her short life, and her works include, The Vespers of Palermo, a drama, which was not successful; The Forest Sanctuary (1826), her best poem; Records of Woman, Lays of Leisure Hours, Songs of the Affections, Hymns for Childhood, and Thoughts during Sickness (1834), her last effort. In 1829 she visited Scotland, where she was the guest of Scott, who held her in affectionate regard. She also enjoyed the friendship of Wordsworth. Always somewhat delicate, her health latterly entirely gave way, and she died of a decline in 1835. Her shorter pieces enjoyed much popularity, and still retain a certain place, owing to their grace and tenderness, but her long poems are lacking in energy and depth, and are forgotten.[1]

Family[]

Hemans was born Felicia Dorothea Browne in Liverpool, the daughter of George Browne, merchant of Liverpool, and at 1 time Imperial and Tuscan consul there. Her grandfather was George Browne of Passage, co. Cork. Her mother, Felicity, daughter of Benedict Park Wagner of North Hall, near Wigan, is said to have been of mingled German, Italian, and Lancashire descent. Felicia had 3 brothers: Sir Thomas Henry Browne, K.C.H. (1787-1855), who distinguished himself in the Peninsular war; Lieutenant-colonel George Baxter Browne, C.B., also engaged in the Peninsula; and Claude Scott Browne, who was deputy assistant commissary-general in Upper Canada, and died at Kingston in that province in 1821. Reference to the last is made by his sister in Graves of a Household.[2]

Youth and education[]

In 1800 her father, forced by commercial reverses to leave Liverpool, settled with his family at Gwrych, near Abergele, North Wales, where Felicia was brought up, her education being superintended by her mother. She was a beautiful and precocious child, with a quick and retentive memory. She began to write verses at an early age, and when she was 14 her parents were unwise enough to publish her Poems in a quarto volume (Liverpool, 1808). She soon recovered from the harsh criticism which the volume met with, and in the same year published England and Spain; or, Valour and Patriotism: A poem, inspired by the engagement of her 2 brothers in the Peninsular war.[2]

Percy Bysshe Shelley, after reading her 1st volume, and hearing from his friend Medwin, who had met her, of her personal charm, wrote to her inviting her to correspond with him. But she declined, and when Shelley persisted in sending her further letters, her mother is said to have intervened and to have induced Shelley's friends to make him cease writing.[3] In 1812 she published Domestic Affections, and other poems. [2]

Career[]

In person Mrs. Hemans was of middle height, well proportioned, her head beautifully formed and set. She was bright and attractive in conversation, in which her intellectual alertness was helped by her wide reading, linguistic acquirements, and remarkable memory.[4]

In 1812, sfter a 3 years' attachment, she married in 1812 Captain Hemans, an Irish gentleman, who had served with his regiment (the 4th foot) in Spain. For a short time they lived at Daventry, Northamptonshire, but returned to Wales. 5 children, all boys, were born:[2] Arthur, born in 1812 and died at Rome in February 1837; Claude, who went to America in 1834; George Willoughby, who was engaged in the ordnance survey; Henry William, who in 1835 became British consul at Buffalo, U.S.A., was a contributor to the North American Review, and died at Pard, Brazil, 20 June 1871; and Charles Isidore Hemans.[4]

For some unexplained reason the union was severed in 1818. Captain Hemans went abroad in that year, and never saw his wife again.[2] Before the separation Mrs. Hemans published 2 volumes, The Restoration of the Works of Art to Italy, 1816, and Modern Greece, 1817.

In 1818 her volume of Translations from Camoens and other Poets came out, and in 1819 Tales and Historic Scenes. In 1820 The Sceptic appeared.[2]

She then made the acquaintance of Reginald Heber, afterwards bishop of Calcutta,[2] who encouraged her to produce another poem in defence of religion, which she entitled Superstition and Error. About the same time she contributed some prose essays on foreign literature to the Edinburgh Monthly Magazine, and wrote Stanzas on the Death of the late King, 1820.[4]

A volume called Welsh Melodies appeared in 1822, and she was about the same time induced to write a 5-act tragedy, the Vespers of Palermo. This was produced at Covent Garden Theatre on 12Dec. 1823, with C.M. Young, Charles Kemble, and Miss Kelly in the principal parts. It was a tedious, spiritless play, unsuited to the stage, and was immediately withdrawn. It was shortly afterwards put on the boards at Edinburgh with some success. She subsequently wrote 2 other plays, The Siege of Valencia, 1823, and De Chatillon, neither of which was acted.[4]

In 1825, after a zealous study of German language and literature, she published her Lays of Many Lands and the Forest Sanctuary, her own favourite among her works. In the 2 edition of the Forest Sanctuary, 1829, "Casabianca" first appeared. The 'Records of Women' followed in 1828, and the 'Songs of the Affections' in 1830. In addition to these books she contributed to Blackwood's and Colburn's magazines and other periodicals. Her reputation, which rapidly grew in Britain, extended to America, where a collected edition of her poems was issued in 1825 by Professor Norton.[4]

In 1825 she moved from Bronwylfa, her eldest brother's house near St. Asaph, Flintshire, where she had lived since 1809, to Rhyllon, a house only a quarter of a mile away. After the death of her mother in 1827, her health, already impaired, showed signs of further failure, and in the summer of the following year she moved to Wavertree, near Liverpool.[4]

In July 1829 she visited Scotland, and made the acquaintance of Sir Walter Scott; and afterwards went to the English lakes. There she met Wordsworth, who a few years later commemorated her in his Epitaphs, No. xii. stanza 10. On a 2nd visit to Scotland she made the acquaintance of Lord Jeffrey.[4]

In 1831 she moved to Dublin, where her brother George was chief commissioner of police. There, while avoiding general society, she enjoyed the friendship of Sir William Rowan Hamilton, Archbishop Whately, and Blanco White. At Dublin she published two small volumes of religious verse, Hymns on the Works of Nature, 1833, and Hymns for Childhood, 1834 (but first published in 1827 in America), and in 1834 National Lyrics and Songs for Music, and Scenes and Hymns of Life.[4]

Her health was now completely shattered, and she gradually sank until 16 May 1835, when she died. She was buried in St. Anne's Church, Dublin.[4]

Writing[]

Her poems are stamped with feminine qualities; they have singular grace and tenderness, and exhibit an ardent sympathy with chivalry in every form. In her own day Lord Jeffrey, Byron, the Countess of Blessington, and Christopher North were among her admiring critics or readers. But her poetry lacks deep thought or subtle emotion, and although it had immense popularity in its day, its sweetness and fluency have long palled upon the taste of thoughtful readers.[4]

England and Spain[]

Her 2nd book, England and Spain; or, Valor and patriotism, published in 1808, was a narrative poem honoring her brother and his military service in the Peninsular War. The poem called for an end of the tyranny of Napoleon Bonaparte and for a long lasting peace after the war. The poem is very patriotic towards Great Britain as seen in Heman's multiple references to "Albion" which is an older name for the isles of Great Britain..[5]

For this thy noble sons have spread alarms,
And bade the zones resound with BRITAIN's arms!"[6]

It is seen throughout this poem that Felicia Hemans is alarmed with the thought of war but her overall pride of nationality overcome this fear. She saw all of the fighting as useless bloodshed and a waste of human life. "England and Spain" was used by her to spread her message across Europe, that the wars were senseless and that peace should resume.[5]

Casabianca[]

Originally published in August 1826, the poem "Casabianca" (also known as "The Boy stood on the Burning Deck")[7] depicts the death of 10-year-old Giocante Casabianca (son of Captain Luc-Julien-Joseph Casabianca, captain of the French flagship Orient) during the Battle of the Nile:

Casabianca fought heroically until his death. During the course of battle, he ordered Giocante, his 10-year-old son who accompanied him, to remain in a section of the ship until he called for him. Although the ship was on fire, the boy, who did not know that his father was no longer alive, refused to leave his post without receiving his orders. After the fire reached the gunpowder section, the ship exploded; the child perished, along with an unknown number of crewmen.[8]

The poem is in ballad meter; its plot consists of a boy asking his father whether he had fulfilled his duties, as the ship continues to burn after the magazine catches fire:.[5]

     "Speak, father!" once again he cried,
     "If I may yet be gone!"
     And but the booming shots replied,
     And fast the flames rolled on. [9]

The poem was very popular from the 1850s on, and was memorized in elementary schools for literary practice. Other writers such as Elizabeth Bishop and Samuel Butler have alluded to the poem in their own works.[5]

Female suicide[]

In many of Hemans' works, a choice is made by a female characters to take her own life rather than suffer the social, political, and personal consequences of a compromised situation. The social context in which Hemans was writing was not largely conducive to the writing of women, as many modern readers might assume according to the poet's success. Instead, women writers were often torn between a choice of home or the pursuit of a literary career. [4] Hemans herself was able to balance both roles without much public ridicule, but left hints of discontent through the themes of feminine death in her writing. [5] The suicides of women in Hemans' poetry dwell on the same social issue that was confronted both culturally and personally during Hemans' life: the choice of caged domestication or freedom of thought and expression..[5] [6]

'The Bride of the Greek Isle', 'The Sicilian Captive', 'The Last Song of Sappho', and 'Indian Women's Death Song' are some of the most notable of Hemans' works involving women's suicides. Each poem portrays a heroine who is untimely torn from her home by a masculine force- such as pirates, Vikings, and unrequited lovers- and forced to make the decision to accept her new confines or command control over the situation. None of the heroines are complacent with the tragedies that befall them, and the women ultimately take their own lives in either a final grasp for power and expression or means to escape victimization. [7] The true reasons for the recurring femicide in Hemans' poetry collections can only be found in readers' personal interpretations, giving speculation to Hemans' life and cultural context..[5]

Critical reputation[]

Hemans' works appeared in 19 individual books during her lifetime. After her death in 1835 they were republished widely, usually as collections of individual lyrics and not the longer, annotated works and integrated series that made up her books. For surviving women poets, like Britons Caroline Norton and Letitia Elizabeth Landon, Americans Lydia Sigourney and Frances Harper, the French Amable Tastu and German Annette von Droste-Hülshoff, and others, she was a valued model, or (for Elizabeth Barrett Browning) a troubling predecessor; and for male poets including Tennyson and Longfellow, an influence less acknowledged. To many readers she offered a woman's voice confiding a woman's trials; to others a lyricism apparently consonant with Victorian chauvinism and sentimentality. Among the works she valued most were the unfinished Superstition and Revelation and her pamphlet The Sceptic, which sought an Anglicanism more attuned to world religions and women's experiences. In her most successful book, Records of Woman (1828), she chronicles the lives of women, both famous and anonymous..[5]

Despite her illustrious admirers, her stature as a serious poet gradually declined, partly due to her success in the literary marketplace. Her poetry was considered morally exemplary, and was often assigned to schoolchildren; as a result, Hemans came to be seen a poet for children rather than taken seriously on the basis of her entire body of work. A jocular reference by Saki in The Toys of Peace suggests simultaneously that she was a household word and that Saki did not take her seriously. Schoolchildren in the U.S. were still being taught The Landing of the Pilgrim Fathers in New England ("The breaking waves dashed high / On a stern and rock-bound coast...") in the middle of the 20th century. But by the 21st century, The Stately Homes of England refers to Noel Coward's parody, not to the once-famous poem it parodied, and Felicia Hemans was remembered popularly for her poem, "Casabianca".[5]

However, Hemans' critical reputation has been re-examined in recent years. Her work has resumed a role in standard anthologies and in classrooms and seminars and literary studies, especially in the U.S. It is likely that further poems will be familiar to new readers, such as "The Image in Lava," "Evening Prayer at a Girls' School," "I Dream of All Things Free," "Night-Blowing Flowers," "Properzia Rossi," "A Spirit's Return," "The Bride of the Greek Isle," "The Wife of Asdrubal," "The Widow of Crescentius," "The Last Song of Sappho," and "Corinne at the Capitol."[5]


Recognition[]

In 1819 she gained a prize for best poem on the Meeting of Bruce and Wallace (published 1819).[2]

In 1821 she won a prize offered by the Royal Society of Literature with a poem on Dartmoor.[4]

She was the subject of a bust by Angus Fletcher, a portrait by W.E. West, engraved by Scriven, and another portrait by E. Robertson Graves, Life of Sir W.R. Hamilton, i. (605).[4]

A collective edition of her works, with memoir by her sister, Mrs. Hughes, was published in 1839, 7 vols. 12mo; another, chronologically arranged, in 1849, one volume royal 8vo. Among many American editions is one by Rufus Wilmot Griswold, with an essay on her genius by H.T. Tuckerman, Philadelphia, 1850.[4]

Her poem "Dirge" was included in the Oxford Book of English Verse, 1250-1900.[10]

In popular culture[]

Martin Gardner and Michael R. Turner wrote parodies of "Casablanca" that had boys stuffing their faces with peanuts and breads.

The phrase "Stately home" comes from Hemans' poem The Homes of England (1827), the first line of which runs, "The stately Homes of England".

Publications[]

Hemans Poetical Works

Poetry[]

Plays[]

  • The Vespers of Palermo: A tragedy in five acts. London: John Murray, 1823.
  • The Siege of Valencia. London: John Murray, 1823
    • A parallel text edition (edited by Susan J. Wolfson & Elizabeth A. Fay). Peterborough, ON, 7 Orchard Park, NY: Broadview Press, 2002.
  • "Sebastian of Portugal: A dramatic fragment". London: Winter's Wreath, 1831.
  • De Chatillon; or, The crusaders: A tragedy. London: 1844.
  • Dramatic Works. Edinburgh: William Blackwood, 1850.

Juvenile[]

Translated[]

Collected editions[]

  • The Works of Mrs. Hemans: With a memoir of her life by her sister (memoir by Harriet Dale Owen). (7 volumes), Edinburgh: William Blackwood, 1839. Volume I, Volume II, Volume III, Volume IV, Volume V, Volume VI, Volume VII.
  • Felicia Hemans: Selected poems, prose, and letters (edited by Gary Kelly). New York: 1997; Peterborough, ON: Broadview Press, 2002.
  • Selected Poems, Letters, Reception Materials (edited by Susan Wolfson). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2000.


Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy WorldCat.[11]

See also[]

Dirge_by_Felicia_Dorothea_Hemans

Dirge by Felicia Dorothea Hemans

Casabianca_(The_Boy_Stood_On_The_Burning_Deck_)~_by_Felicia_Dorothea_Hemans.

Casabianca (The Boy Stood On The Burning Deck )~ by Felicia Dorothea Hemans.

References[]

  • "Cambridge Bibliography of English Literature," 3rd ed., 4: 351-60 (2000)
  • Emma Mason, "Women Poets of the Nineteenth Century" (2006)
  • "Felicia Hemans: Reimagining Poetry in the Nineteenth Century," ed. Nanora Sweet & Julie Melnyk (2001)
  • Paula Feldman, "The Poet and the Profits: Felicia Hemans and the Literary Marketplace," "Keats-Shelley Journal" 46 (1996): 148-76
  • Peter W. Trinder, "Mrs Hemans," U Wales Press (1984)
  • PD-icon Sutton, Charles William (1891) "Hemans, Felicia Dorothea" in Stephen, Leslie; Lee, Sidney Dictionary of National Biography 25 London: Smith, Elder, pp. 382-383 . Wikisource, Web, Mar. 18, 2017.

Notes[]

  1. ↑ John William Cousin, "Hemans, Felicia Dorothea," A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature, 1910, 185. Web, Jan. 24, 2018.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 2.6 2.7 Sutton, 382.
  3. ↑ Dowden, Life of Shelley, i. 49-50.
  4. ↑ 4.00 4.01 4.02 4.03 4.04 4.05 4.06 4.07 4.08 4.09 4.10 4.11 4.12 Sutton, 383.
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 5.5 5.6 5.7 5.8 Felicia Hemans, Wikipedia, December 21, 2017, Wikimedia Foundation. Web, Jan. 24, 2018.
  6. ↑ [1]
  7. ↑ [2]
  8. ↑ Luc-Julien-Joseph Casabianca, Wikimedia, May 22, 2020, Wikimedia Foundation. Web, June 23, 2020.
  9. ↑ [3]
  10. ↑ "Dirge," Oxford Book of English Verse, 1250-1900 (edited by . Arthur Quiller-Couch), Oxford, UK: Clarendon, 1919. Bartleby.com, Web, May 5, 2012.
  11. ↑ Search results = au:Felicia Hemans, WorldCat, OCLC Online Computer Library Center Inc. Web, Aug. 29, 2013.

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PD-icon This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, the Dictionary of National Biography (edited by Leslie Stephen). London: Smith, Elder, 1885-1900. Original article is at: Hemans, Felicia Dorothea

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