COMING UP : THIS MISTRESS WILL CHALLENGE YOUR IDEAS ABOUT A LEGENDARY HOLLYWOOD COUPLE

Ohhh... I was surprised too! I almost hate to...

See you in a couple days!  

Missy

WHAT MISTRESS OF THE MONTH ATTRACTED YOU TO THIS BLOG?

I know that the more hits a subject or post gets, the higher up in the ranking, and sometimes that just isn't fair because I spend a lot of time researching for newer subjects and posts too.

I wonder.  WHAT MISTRESS OF THE MONTH ATTRACTED YOU TO THIS BLOG?

Missy

ACORN OF THE MIGHTY OAK

 

CHECK OUT THIS DOCUMENTARY BY ABSOLUTE HISTORY - TRUTH ABOUT PLEASURE AND LOVE IN A VICTORIAN MARRIAGE

I was so impressed with this.  I know for some of you this will be a bit long, but if you're into this month's subject, you'll understand...

ACORNS

 

HIS MEHBOOBA WILL SOMEDAY BE QUEEN CONSORT!

Camilla Shand, Camilla Parker-Bowles, Camilla - Duchess of Cornwall.  Not for nothing has she been featured here at MISTRESS MANIFESTO in May 2010 and April 2016 as the most famous Mistress who became a wife in the 20th-21st century!  (Check those months out!)

Recently on Queen Elizabeth II's Platinum Jubilee (70 years on the throne), she made it clear that Prince Charles will become King when she is deceased. No, he will not be punished because he divorced Lady Diana Spencer.  History is history and life must go on.  I'm sure this statement from the Palace was designed to end the rumors that the throne will skip over Charles and go right to his son, heir Prince William. Of course, anything could happen as the Queen is seriously old and Prince Charles is over 70 years old himself.

Prince Charles and Camilla Shand married in 2005 and have been careful to publicly have a wait and see attitude about the throne and what her title will be.

So very many articles came out about the Queen's official statement.  And the statement which appeared in the Daily Mail UK and then other publications showed the statement on official stationery.  Camilla will be called Queen Consort.

Most delightful recently was the reveal that Prince Charles affectionately calls Camilla, Mehbooba, which is an Urdu language word for My Beloved. Camilla, called by Princess Diana 'the third person' in her marriage, is said to be a perfect companion for the Prince, who, in my opinion, could of and should have married her in the first place.  We don't always know it when we meet a soul mate do we?

This article from the Daily Mail also says that she will be wearing one of the most majestic Crowns ever made at the Coronation of Charles.  Wow!

DAILY MAIL : CAMILLA TO WEAR CROWN THAT HOLDS THE KOH NOR DIAMONND

WHAT THE POETRY FOUNDATION SAYS ABOUT GEORGE ELIOT

POETRY FOUNDATION on GEORGE ELIOT's POETRY 

A literary biography here, one of the things I found fascinating about George, is her beginnings as a devout Christian which she eventually removed herself from.

Excerpt:  In 1841, Eliot came in contact with a group of philosophical thinkers, and her passionate commitment to Christianity began to find new directions  By early 1842 Eliot questioned the historical foundations of Christianity so much that she both abandoned her faith and stopped attending church services, a move that led to strenuous conflict with her father.  Eliot eventually resumed church attendance but did not return to active faith.

*****

If you're interested in women who were also writers and poets, who were also Mistresses or Courtesans, you might want to look into posts in my archives  for VERONICA FRANCO -February 2015 , CAROLE MALLORY June 2019 (Mistress of Norman Mailer), and PEARL KAZIN (Literary Editor of poet Dylan Thomas).

ALINA KABAEVA - VLADIMIR PUTIN'S MISTRESS - LOCATION UNKNOWN - CALL TO HAVE HER RETURNED TO RUSSIA

Back in February of 2011, I featured ALINA KABEYEVA as Mistress of the Month, for her highly rumored relationship with President of Russia, Vladimir Putin. Although President Putin desires that there be no coverage of his personal life, Alina, a rhythmic gymnast, was a star athlete in her time, an Olympic gold medal winner, famous in her own right due to her accomplishments and beauty, and has been an irresistible topic for journalists.  

While awarded a professional position in business in which she reportedly earns about $8 million a year, the mysterious Putin as a lover and father of two to four children, simply makes her even more interesting. (Since my postings on her, in which I mentioned she reportedly has had two sons, there are reports that she also has twin daughters. There have also been mentions that she as well as Putin have been seen in public wearing wedding bands. Further, there are reports of a young daughter of another Putin mistress living in Monaco.) Now there is a call for Alina and her children to leave Switzerland, where she is reportedly living in a well secured house.  Because of the myriad of takes on this situation I want to mention an awareness but also that these reports remain "where there's smoke, there's fire." Therefore, I'm not going to link to any news posts or a post that might be more correct than another at the moment while continuing to watch the story build.

I've been following the news on the war against Ukraine by Russia intensely and I don't want my readers to think otherwise. I'm horrified at the aggression, the attacks on civilians, the destruction of infrastructure such as hospitals, theaters, and schools, and have engaged personally with a number of know-it-all men who have a variety of military and political theories about the entire situation, but I think our President Joseph Biden has a wealth of information from our own military and intelligence and is wise to act as a gentleman to the bully.  And I sure do wonder what Edward Snowden might have to say, since he applied to be a duel citizen of Russia and the United States.

What, if anything does Alina know or think? My guess is that if she is not living in Switzerland, the reports that President Putin has removed his family to an underground city (not just a bunker) in Siberia could even be right.

It's simply impossible for me to imagine that Putin is currently sane because it is currently impossible for me to imagine that he believes what he is saying.  So many people continue to believe the myths of motivation and other information that he controls. He is being compared to Stalin, to Hitler, and one article I read regarding Alina Kabaeva suggested she was his "Eva Braun." ***

Three weeks ago it was reported by some news outlets that the Russians would give it a few days. Now the situation seems to be more intense than ever. Sanctions are in place that are intended to cancel the wealth of the Oligarchs, there are reports of people who were in hiding being taken as prisoners to work as slave labor for two or three years, reports of women over the age of 60 being raped and hung or committing suicide. Overall it is tragic and frightening.

The Mistresses of Dictators sometimes give a whole new meaning to the idea that a Woman Should Stand By Her Man!

You may be interested in the following posts in my archives:

RUMORED MISTRESS OF THE MONTH ALINA KABAEVA  and VLADIMIR PUTIN  February 2011

EVA BRAUN MISTRESS OF ADOLF HITLER  - MASTERMIND OF THE HOLOCAUST   June 2010

CLARETTA PETACCI : MISTRESS OF BENITO MUSSOLINI MISTRESS OF THE MONTH March 2011

LIDA  BAAROVA - MISTRESS OF NAZI JOSEPH GOEBBELS WHO PAID THE PRICE FOR ASSOCIATING WITH NAZIS  June 2020

MARITA LORENZ : MISTRESS OF FIDEL CASTRO (and then GENERAL MARCOS PERES JIMENEZ) TURNED CIA COLLABORATOR - MISTRESS OF THE MONTH  May 2015

HUSBAND JOHN CROSS on HIS WIFE OF SEVERAL MONTHS GEORGE ELIOT : PRESERVING HER LEGACY

GUTENBERG ORG : THE LIFE OF GEORGE ELIOT by HER HUSBAND JOHN CROSS 

A great number of images include etching of George and various houses she lived in, including that of her family stead.  Titled GEORGE ELIOT'S LIFE as related in her Letters and Journals - Arranged and Edited By Her Husband J.W. Cross, this is another opportunity to read a book on line.

Notes:  The very last chapter of part three outlines the relationship between George and John.  He had known her as a friend of her family from his youth and was just as interested in literature as she and G. H. Lewes, who he also knew.  Cross reports that after the death of Lewes, George was in grief although she was also trying to attend to her husband's manuscripts (writing), and that she herself was in failing health with bouts of pain (renal failure), and that she did ask for him to come and visit her.  George is dealing with depression and physical pain from her own illness and in her letters she discusses her daily doings, concerns with literature, as well as her problems.

Excerpt:  During our short married life our time was so much divided between travelling and illness that George Eliot wrote very little, so that I have but slight personal experience of how the creative effort affected her. But she told me that, in all that she considered her best writing, there was a 'Not herself," which took possession of her, and that she felt her own personality to be merely the instrument through which this spirit, as it were, was acting. 

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STURDY

 

WHO WERE THE "FREE THINKERS" and WHAT DID THEY BELIEVE?

 HUMANISTS UK - 19th CENTURY FREE THINKERS

The first thing I want to mention here is that if you research the words "Free Thinkers" you will find that a number of groups do currently use these words to describe themselves including some people we would think of as anti-Democrat politically. We have to be careful to eliminate those more contemporary groups when looking at the world that George Eliot, G.H. Lewes, and others inhabited in the 19th Century Europe. Actually, when I tripped across these anti-Democratic types on the Internet and saw what they advocate for, I thought they opposed what the 19th century group was for!

I encourage you to read this article, which explains.

Excerpt: Humanist thinking developed rapidly in the nineteenth century because it was closely associated with new scientific thinking and discoveries. Darwin's ideas, and new biblical research and scholarship coming from Germany, provoked a crisis of faith in many Victorian intellectuals, movingly evoked in Matthew Arnold's famous poem Dover Beach, Darwin's defender T.H. Huxley coined the word "agnostic" to describe his belief that there were things that we could not possibly know.

The Positivist movement of Auguste Comte put forward a personal and humanistic religion, and was fashionable and profoundly influential for several decades.  The German theologian and philosopher Feuerbach attacked conventional Christianity in a book translated by Mary Ann Evans/George Eliot as "The Essence of Christianity" (1854), and suggested that religion was "the dream of the human mind", projecting onto an illusory god our own ideals and nature. German scholarship also demonstrated that the books of the Bible were fallible human constructions, not divine revelation.

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G.H. LEWES and HIS WIFE AGNES JERVIS and MISTRESS GEORGE ELIOT - FREE THINKERS?

According to author Jenny Uglow, George and the more citified G.H. met - I must say appropriately - in a book shop in October of 1851. He was not attractive physically but honed a wit and was intellectually curious.  He had married Agnes Jervis in 1841 when he was about twenty-four.  A decade later he was considered a womanizer, a cheater, and gave Agnes a difficult time - though the couple were said to have been influenced by FREE THINKING. Was the marriage dead or was remaining married while having others romantically an ideal way of life for them?  (We must remember that this was an extremely controversial way of life at the time they lived it.)

Agnes took a lover - a married man - and had a child by this other man. G.H. stayed married and George Eliot resided with the couple for a time.  She lived openly with them.  (I sense an arrangement!)

G.H. and George traveled together, she remained childless, and as she aged was known to have a few "spiritual daughters."  Usually women young enough to have a mother her age, but I do wonder if these were lesbian relationships.  The author doesn't say...

MISSY HAS A QUESTION FOR YOU! ARE YOU IN LOVE?

Have you ever been in love with two people at the same time and felt the need to choose?  

What happened?

Please read my comment policy in Pages!  I read every comment and will not publish those that start with the words DO NOT PUBLISH!

FEMINIST NOVELS? GEORGE ELIOT

According to Jenny Uglow, author, there is still a question of if it was George Eliot's intent to write "feminist" novels.  She personally associated with some feminist of her day, Victorian feminists. In her writing, she portrayed oppressed women, submissive women, and she personally was supposed to be uninterested in marriage as a young woman, rejecting a marriage that might be arranged - or at least suggested.

I personally had some unanswered questions reading this book. I have wondered if perhaps George Eliot's relationship with G.H. Lewes was chaste.  If not, what did she do to prevent becoming a mother?  Is it possible that George and G.H. Lewes were not heterosexual?

SOME NOVELS OF GEORGE ELIOT and OPPORTUNITIES TO READ THEM

If you run a check on the Internet you'll find that some hard back versions of George Eliot's works are quite expensive and that you can buy "complete works" which are about 12 hardback books, or 8 novels. They are often available in other languages besides English. These have also been republished in paperback and generally available through a good library system. Here are some images of her novels that are taught in many colleges here in the United States. I searched for these images using the terms "public domain vintage George Eliot novels."

MIDDLEMARCH from Project Gutenberg, an opportunity to read public domain literature for free on the Internet.

GUTENBERG PROJECT -Free Books

SILAS MARNER image from Pinterest. 

DANIEL DERONDA from Good Reads

Cover of CD for ADAM BEDE from another opportunity, LibriVox, which allows you to hear the novel read to you.

LIBRI VOX - ADAM BEDE by GEORGE ELIOT

ENGLISH OAK

 

A MOMENT OF SILENCE FOR UKRAINE

 

"GEORGE ELIOT" HONORED ENGLISH LITERARY PERSON WHO LIVED THE MOST UNCONVENTIONAL "VICTORIAN" LIFE

GEORGE ELIOT

Mary Ann Evans

1819-1880

The masculine sounding writer's pseudonym, GEORGE ELIOT, was adopted by Mary Ann Evans because she did not want to be known as a "woman writer," but judged for her work as the men writers of her times were. She wanted to bypass Victorian sexism. Still, she could not hide behind the name-of-the-plume forever, because with fame came interest in her as a woman and interest in her early upbringing and personal life. 

"George" became known as a literary great and is held in high regard today as an author of several novels which have inspired plays and films. Her alternative lifestyle a century and half ago intrigues us and while I won't go deeply into her literary work, I want to start out by acknowledging her accomplishments. She was an intellectual woman who, according to John W. Cross in his work "George Eliot's Life as related in her Letters and Journals", also read in several languages. She was the Literature Major's ideal, someone who read constantly, preferably in the original language of the author's publication, examining each sentence closely. He wrote, "In foreign languages George Eliot had an experience more unusual among women than among men. With a complete literary and scholarly knowledge of French, German, Italian, and Spanish, she spoke all four languages with difficulty, though accurately and grammatically; but the mimetic power of catching intonation and accent was wanting. Greek and Latin she could read with thorough delight to herself, and Hebrew was a favorite study to the end of her life."

George's life choices left her abandoned by a brother and sister who felt her immorality tainted their family reputation and status. After all, they had been raised to be devout Christians and no doubt about it, her poetry and literary work revealed a great faith in Christianity - at first.  What happened then that George went against some of the most profound teachings of that faith as well as her family, her heritage, and the way most of her peers thought to live? How could she be with a married man, George Henry Lewes, a philosopher and also an author, and openly, for so many years? And how could she, at the very end of her life, marry, and marry a man twenty years younger than she, John W. Cross? Was she a 19th century "Cougar?"  Or perhaps a bit like American artist Georgia O'Keeffe who had her much younger companion partner in her much older years?  The answer is that she was influenced by the Free Thinkers.

Primary Reference : George Elliot by Jennifer Uglowith/ Jenny Uglow. I read the old hard cover edition from cover to cover. This book is called a Feminist Biography.

Did George believe in marriage all along and simply not marry the man to whom she experienced mutual devotion because he could not divorce?

I was thinking "The Crown" on Netflix and how much that series reveals about The Church of England and marriage and what aristocrats, in particular the men, thought about marriage. Divorce was said to be unthinkable and so many persisted unhappy, while it was fine that the men have affairs or mistresses while the women kept the family together for the sake of the children, if not themselves. This was the case, as the series implies, with the marriage of Queen Elizabeth II and her husband, Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, who is said to have had affairs. It would seem that Elizabeth and Philip by necessity of duty, lived quite a bit apart. 

When a man is married and especially when he has children with the wife he married, he enters into a financial contract.  Among the aristocrats, rank and money matter and so does keeping land and money in the family. So we often ask ourselves how such a man also finances having a Classic Mistress, a woman who often does not have money equal to his. We know that sometimes a mistress does have her own money and that today many women support themselves but their man's financial contributions to their welfare and that of their children elevate their lives. Eliot never had children and we do not know if that was by choice, through biological inability, contraception, agreement.

Born in 1819, to a comfortable but not especially rich family, Mary Ann Evans was considered exceptionally well educated - for a woman. However, we wonder at their expectations of her to fulfill the usual feminine role of wife and mother. There are still today people who see going to college as a way to meet a husband or who see education as personal achievement that makes them better mothers. Like other literary women featured here at Mistress Manifesto BlogSpot, women who were bound by conventional feminine roles, Mary Ann lived in a world that considered women who earned their own money almost radical.

She first published a poem in 1940. In 1846, still a devout Evangelical Christian, she published a work on the Life of Jesus that was critically acclaimed. In 1848 she met the poet Emerson, indicating that she was considered worthy due to her talent to enter into the world of the male literary elite. It wasn't until 1849 that she began experimenting with a name change, first thinking Marianne or Marian would be better than Mary Ann.

By 1853, she and G. H. Lewes * became notably close. She traveled with him to Germany and then in 1855 the two began to live together in London. Then the two moved to the smaller, more isolated Richmond. In 1857, when she was about 38 years old, and already published under her given name at birth, she changed her name to George Eliot. 

About this time, having openly traveled and been seen as a couple by London society, her brother, and then her sister, abandoned her. Together the unconventional couple continued European travel, visiting Rome, Naples, Florence, and Switzerland. She was also beginning to actively publish and so we can see that the relationship and lifestyle was one in which she as a writer could thrive. Her first acclaimed novel in 1861 was Silas Mariner. In 1870 the couple visited Germany, Prague, and Austria and by 1877 they were being socially introduced to royals. But Lewes had cancer and died in 1878 and George herself was physically failing with kidney disease and had bouts of pain. 

Just a few months after the death of G.H., George married a man about twenty years younger than she, Johnny Cross. Talk about a May-December romance! They married in May and in December she died, only sixty-one.

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(*I want to mention her that in more than one account of their relationship it is specifically mentioned that the man was considered ugly.  I have to say that after looking at many images of George, the image on the book cover is one of the most complimentary of her.)

If interested in Georgia O'Keeffe, who was first a mistress and photography muse and then, in her later years, seemed to keep a younger man who assisted her in her artist life. August 2011 was dedicated to Georgia.

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