Overview

With Mathilde Blind: Late-Victorian Culture and the Woman of Letters, James Diedrick offers a groundbreaking critical biography of the German-born British poet Mathilde Blind (1841–1896)—a freethinking radical feminist. Born to politically radical parents, by the time she was thirty Blind had become a pioneering female aesthete in a mostly male community of writers, painters, and critics, including Algernon Charles Swinburne, William Morris, Ford Madox Brown, William Michael Rossetti, and Richard Garnett. By the 1880s she was widely recognized for a body of writing that engaged contemporary issues (such as the Woman Question, the forced eviction of Scottish tenant farmers in the Highland Clearances, and Darwin’s evolutionary theory), and she subsequently emerged as a prominent voice and indeed a leader among New Woman writers at the end of the century, including Mona Caird, Rosamund Marriott Watson, and Katharine Tynan. She also developed important associations with leading male decadent writers of the fin de siècle, most notably Oscar Wilde and Arthur Symons. Despite her extensive contributions to Victorian debates on aesthetics, religion, nationhood, imperialism, gender, and sexuality, however, Blind has yet to receive the prominence she deserves in studies of the period. As the first full-length biography of this trailblazing woman of letters, Mathilde Blind underscores the importance of her poetry and her critical writings (her work on Shelley, biographies of George Eliot and Madame Roland, and her translations of Feuerbach and Bashkirtseff) for the literature and culture of the fin de siècle.

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9780813939315

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Reviews

This groundbreaking study of Mathilde Blind is a must-read for all who are interested in aestheticism, nineteenth-century women's studies, Victorian poetry, radical politics, transnationalism, and publishing history. An immigrant with deft command of English, a poet equally at home in delicate lyrics and bold narratives, a beautiful woman who attracted men but also gravitated toward desire for women, Mathilde Blind defies easy categorization. The depth of James Diedrick's research and the figure he reveals alike dazzle.</p>--Linda K. Hughes, Texas Christian University, author of <i>The Cambridge Introduction to Victorian Poetry</i>

Mathilde Blind is a groundbreaking critical biography of the Germanborn British aesthete. An important, must-read book. -Ana Parejo Vadillo, Birkbeck University of London

"“Mathilde Blind is a groundbreaking critical biography of the Germanborn British aesthete. An important, must-read book.” —Ana Parejo Vadillo, Birkbeck University of London ""Diedrick's account builds a picture of an intelligent and passionate advocate of women's rights, a thoughtful writer who engaged deeply with the society in which she worked. Blind would likely have approved of this way of portraying her."" - The TLS"

Author Information

James Diedrick, Professor of English at Agnes Scott College, is the author of Understanding Martin Amis.

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