Life
1816-1879 [‘blind poetess of Donegal’; occas. Brown; var. 1870];
b. 16 Jan., Stranorlar, Co. Donegal, dg. village postmaster of Stranorlar;
ed. school of Mr McGranahan; first poems in Northern Whig, sent for publication
without her knowledge; contributed first to Irish Penny Journal,
then Hood’s Magazine and Athenaeum; civil pension awarded
by Robert Peel; left Ireland and settled Edinburgh, 1847; protegée
of John Wilson, Prof. of Moral philosophy (pseud. Christopher North);
hired by Chamber’s Mag., moved to London on gift of £100 from Lord
Lansdowne; died of heart ailment; Granny’s Wonderful Chair,
reputedly plagiarised by Frances Hodgson Burnett, author of The Secret
Garden, in a reissue of 1904 prefaced by her enthusiastic introduction;
received Civil List pension; Pictures and Songs of Home (1856);
also published poems in Athenaeum. CAB JMC DBIV DIW DIB MAC
RAF SUTH ATT OCIL
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Works
The Star of Attéghei; The Vision of Schwartz, and Other Poems
(London: Edward Moxon 1844); Lyrics and Miscellaneous Poems
(Edinburgh: Sutherland & Knox 1848); The Ericksons; The
Clever Boy, or Consider Another (two stories for my young friends)
(Edinburgh: Paton & Richie 1852); Pictures and songs of Home
(London: T. Nelson & Sons [1856]); Granny’s Wonderful Chair
and Its Tales of Fairy Times (London: Griffith & Farran 1857)
[see edns., infra]; Our Uncle the Traveller’s
Stories (London: W. Kenty 1859); My Share of the World, an autobiography
(London: Hurst & Blackett 1861); The Castleford Case (3 vols.,
London: Hurst & Blackett 1862); The Orphans of Elfholm (London:
Groombridge [1862]); The Young Foresters (London: Groombridge [1864]);
The Hidden Sin (3 vols., London: n.p. 1866) [anon.]; The Exile’s
Trust, a Tale of the French Revolution and Other Stories (London:
Leisure Hour [1869]); The Nearest Neighbour, and Other Stories
(London: Religious Truth Soc. [1875]); The Dangerous Guest, A Story
of 1745 (London: RTS [1886]); The Foundling of the Fens (London:
RTS [1886]); The First of the African Diamonds (London: RTS [1887].
Qry, Legends of Ulster.
Bibliographical
details
Granny’s Wonderful Chair,
and its Tales of Fairy Times (London: Griffith & Farran 1857),
ill. Kenny Meadows; Do. [another edn.] [1891], ill. Marie Seymour
Lucas, reiss. [1896]; Do. [another edn.] [1900]; Do. [another
edn.] with intro. by Frances Hodgson Burnett [i.e., plagiarised by] as
The Story of the Lost Fairy Book (London & NY: McLuse, Phillips
& Co. 1904); Do. [another edn.], intro. by Dollie Radford (London:
J. M. Dent; NY: E. P. Dutton [1906]), ill. Dora Curtis; Do. [another
edn.] (London: Hodder & Stoughton 1908), col. ill. W. H. Margetson;
Do. [another edn.] (London: S. W. Partridge & Co. 1909); Do.
as ‘Lords of the Castles’, and Other Stories from Granny’s
Wonderful Chair ... with composition exercises] (London: A. C. Black
1909); Do. [another edn.] (London: Blackie & Son [1912]), ill.
A. A. Dixon; Do. [another edn.] (London: G. T. Foulis & Co
1925), ill. ‘Decies’; Do. [another edn. (London: E. P.
Dutton 1913); Do. [another edn.], (London 1925), ill. Charles Folkard;
Do. [another edn]. (London [1926]), ill. R. B. Ogle; Do.
[another edn.] (Toronto & London: Letchworth [1927]); Do. [another
edn., first 3 chaps.] (London: [Brodie Bks. 1927]); Do. [another
edn.], ed. H. A. Treble (Edinburgh & London: Oliver & Boyd [1938]);
Do. [another edn] as ‘The Story of Fairyfoot’, from
Granny’s Wonderful Chair ([London:] Gulliver Little Books [1943]);
Do. [another edn.] (London: Gulliver Popular Library 1943); Do.
[another edn. ‘retold from the story of Frances Browne’ [Silver
Torch Series] (Glasgow: Collins 1947); Do. [another edn.] ([London]:
Roger Ingram 1948), ill. Sylvia Green; Do. [reissue of 1912 edn.]
(London: Blackie & Son [1955]) ... &c.
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- J. R. R. Adams, ‘Frances Brown [sic]: The Blind Poetess of Stranorlar’, in Raphoe Diocesan Magazine (May 1974), pp.5-6; Brenda O’Hanrhan, Donegal Authors: A Bibliography (1982).
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Notes
Patrick Rafroidi, Irish
Literature in English: The Romantic Period, 1789-1850 (Gerrards
Cross: Colin Smythe 1980) lists the poet as ‘Frances Brown’ with dates, 1816-1879.
Elaine Showalter, A Literature of their Own (1984) gives bio-data: b. Donegal, seventh of twelve children of a post-master; blind from childhood; self-educated, left home at 21, to Edinburgh, then London; belonged to Religious Tract Society; remained single; first novel, The Ericksons (1852).
Robert Hogan, ed., Dictionary of Irish Literature (Dublin: Gill & Macmillan 1979), contains an article by Mary Rose Callaghan recounting details of the plagiarism of Granny’s Wonderful Chair, a set of instructive children’s stories, by Frances Hodgson Burnett in 1877, and the subsequent reprinting of the original.
John Sutherland, The Longman Companion to Victorian Fiction (Longmans 1988; rep. 1989), gives bio-data: helped by her sister she turned out articles for magazines incl., after 1841, The Athenaeum. contrib. to Leisure Hour during 20 years; issued The Eriksons (1852); worked for Religious Texts Society [TRS]; issued 18 books incl. Granny’s Wonderful Chair (1857) and autobiography (1861); Civil list pension 1863; died of apoplexy.
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Princess Grace Irish Library (Monaco)