SARAH BERNHARDT'S MEMOIR : MY DOUBLE LIFE : ON PROJECT GUTENBERG

GUTENBERG ORG : SARAH BERNHARDT : MY DOUBLE LIFE 

Ma Double Vie (My Double Life) was published in 1907.  However, scholars don't think it's the most accurate account of Sarah Bernhardt's life. Still, I always think it's important to consider what a person has to say about themselves because who knows a person better?

I think it's interesting the way the book is described in Project Gutenberg: "The book chronicles the extraordinary life and career of the renowned French actress, emphasizing her personal experiences, challenges, and the pivotal moments that shaped her into a theatrical legend. The memoir touches upon themes of childhood, resilience, and the performing arts, offering readers an intimate look at the woman behind the iconic performances. The opening of the memoir introduces Bernhardt's tumultuous early years, revealing the absence of parental care as her mother frequently traveled and left her in the care of a nurse. Bernhardt reflects on her childhood experiences in Brittany, her relationships with her family, and a serious incident during her infancy that required her mother’s hurried return. The narrative sets the tone for Bernhardt's later struggles and triumphs, detailing her feelings of abandonment and the longing for familial affection. As the opening progresses, it hints at her eventual journey towards becoming a prominent actress, interspersing her childhood memories with vivid descriptions of her environment and the care she received from her nurse."

READING THE POETRY OF NORA MAY FRENCH on PROJECT GUTENBERG

 Here's the link! PROJECT GUTENBERG : POETRY OF NORA MAY FRENCH

FROM forest paths we turned us, nymphs, new-made,

And, lifting eyes abashed with great desire

Before high Jove, the gift of souls we prayed.

Whereat he said: “O perfect as new leaves

New glossed and veined with blood of perfect days

And stirred to murmured speech in fragrant eves,

“Still ask ye souls? Behold, I give instead

Into each breast a bird with fettered wings,

A bird fast holden with a silken thread: ........

( read the whole poem at the link!)

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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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

HIGH CHIEFESS JULIA ALAPA'I KAUWA'A's THE MOTHER BY ADOPTION OF JANE LAHILAHI's SON PETER KA'EO

PROJECT GUTTENBERG SELF PUBLISHED WORK by JULIA ALAPAI 

Julia Alapa'i Kauwa'a lived from 1814-1849 and was a contemporary of Jane Lahilahi Young Ka'eo.

In her work, she gives an account of the lifestyle she lived as a member of Royal Hawaiian family, both parents being Chief/Chiefess rank. She also rests in death in the Royal Tomb.

EXCERPT:  (Julia) She became a close friend and attendant (similar to a European lady-in-waiting) of Princess Nahi ena ena, the youngest daughter of Kamehameha  and his most scared wife Keopuolani and the sister of King Kamehameha II and Kamehameha III. During her youth, she along with other attendants of the Princess, the Chiefesses JANE LAHILAHI, Laura Konia, Ulumahelhei Polupolu and Kapoli were punished by Queen Ka'ahumanu for breaking Christian laws and corrupting the young King Kamehameha III who had ascended the throne after his brother's untimely death in London.

She married John Kaleipalhala Young II, more commonly known as Keoni Ana, the son of Kamehameha I's most trusted advisor John Young and a childhood companion of Kamehameha III. The couple remained childless, so in 1836, they adopted in the Hawaiian tradition of hanai, their nephew PETER KA'EO, the son of Joshua Ka'eo and Jane Lahilahi, her husband's sister.

This passage gives us the feel for just how entwinned the Hawaiian Royals were nit also how powerful Queens could be.  High Chiefs and Chiefesses were already feared by common people. The commoners often lived like the serfs in Europe, not owning land and owing the land owner. The Queen had adopted Christianity.  I wonder what is meant by corrupt, but I think it means that they had not accepted Christianity if it meant giving up traditional Hawaiian culture.

Missy

ISADORA DUNCAN's MEMOIR - THE AMERICAN VERSION WAS CENSORED - READ AT PROJECT GUTENBERG

 

GUTENBERG- ISADORA DUNCAN "MY LIFE" MEMOIR  Read it here!

First published in 1927 and after she had tragically died. This link has MANY wonderful pictures of Isadora and the people in her life.  But, by the way, she has a code name for Paris Singer, the name which begins with L.


From chapter 19, about giving birth to her first child, a daughter by Gordon Craig.

"We were all sitting at tea one afternoon, when I felt a thud as if some one had pounded me in the middle of the back, and then a fearful pain, as if some one had put a gimlet into my spine and was trying to break it open. From that moment the torture began, as if I, poor victim, were in the hands of some mighty and pitiless executioner. No sooner had I recovered from one assault than another began. Talk about the Spanish Inquisition! No woman who has borne a child would have to fear it. It must have been a mild sport in comparison. Relentless, cruel, knowing no release, no pity, this terrible, unseen genie had me in his grip, and was, in continued spasms, tearing my bones and my sinews apart. They say such suffering is soon forgotten. All I have to reply is that I have only to shut my eyes and I hear again my shrieks and groans as they were then, like something encircling me apart from my self.

It is unheard-of, uncivilised barbarism, that any woman should still be forced to bear such monstrous torture. It should be remedied. It should be stopped. It is simply absurd that with our modern science painless childbirth does not exist as a matter of course. It is as unpardonable as if doctors should operate for appendicitis without an anæsthetic! What unholy patience, or lack of intelligence, have women in general that they should for one moment endure this outrageous massacre of themselves?"

*****

I got my own English version copy at a used bookstore years ago and found it so Poetical.  Isadora Duncan could probably never be accused of speaking in an ugly, guttural way.  But the book I recently read about her checks her version of her life, as she remembered it, with some other references such as her student Irma's book, the writings of Gordon Craig, and even mentions that some of her book was censored by the publisher, despite her so eloquent and even obscure ways of mentioning sex, for instance, for the American readership.  - Missy