Prof. R. F. Foster (Queen Mary University of London)

Department of English

Thursday 28 November, 6 p.m.

Boole 1 Lecture Theatre

In November, the Department of English in UCC marks the 70th anniversary of the death of the leading Irish woman writer and artist, Edith Somerville (1858-1949).

Born in Corfu, Edith Somerville grew in in Drishane House, Castletownsend, Co. Cork. With her cousin Martin Ross, she wrote one of the great novels of the nineteenth century, The Real Charlotte (1894). They  also published humorous adventures and  sketches in their well known Irish R.M. series. Edith Somerville’s many interests included fox hunting (she was master of hounds from 1903 to 1919),  politics and the arts. She became president of the Munster Women's Franchise League in 1913.  For St Barrahane's, Castletownshend, she commissioned a beautiful series of windows by Harry Clarke. Trinity College Dublin awarded her an honorary D.Litt. in 1932 and she was a founding member of the Irish Academy of Letters.