Kipling Alice - A circle of sisters: Alice Kipling, Georgiana Burne-Jones, Agnes Poynter and Louisa Baldwin

PENGUIN BOOKS

A CIRCLE OF SISTERS

A delightful book. Flanders takes nothing at surface value; alongside a scholars appetite for research she has a novelists delight in inferring the human reason why things happen A Circle of Sisters surely marks a significant moment both in the onward march of group biography and in the understanding of the Victorian woman Lynne Truss, Sunday Times

A Circle of Sisters gives an extraordinarily vivid sense of what it was like to be alive a century ago Rachel Barnes, Guardian

This family would make a fine subject for any competent biographer, but Judith Flanders is far more than competent. Having read her, you could imagine meeting all these women and knowing immediately which was which and what to talk to them about Within her enthralling and often amusing narrative are innumerable snapshots of other characters whose lives touched on those of the sisters: Rossetti, for instance, and William Morris, Gladstone and George Eliot, all of them caught unbuttoned and unposed, and all the more intriguing and convincing for that. And the details of Victorian life are marvellous she brings Victorian England alive Sue Gaisford, Independent

A most impressive debut: a scholarly, entertaining, constantly interesting biography William Trevor

This is a terrific book a biography of four remarkable sisters, all at a go, and also a pageant-like exhibition of Victorian artistic and middle-class life, public and domestic. The astonishing skill of its complex narrative, and the sustaining wealth of allusion and social comment, makes it seem almost incidental that one of the sisters should have been the mother of the Prime Minister and another the mother of Rudyard Kipling Jan Morris

A Circle of Sisters is a revelation. The Macdonald sisters, each interesting in herself, but also an astonishing foursome, blow away all the tired platitudes about Victorian women Roy Porter

The Macdonald sisters were four remarkable women from a humble background, who rose to eminence and helped weave the web of power and influence in Victorian England. Judith Flanders recreates their inner and outer worlds with wit, sympathy and insight Hilary Mantel

A scintillating debut. The author gives fascinating insights into the lives of this brilliant group, holding her huge cast of characters firmly controlled and vividly realized in a finely maintained structure no small feat as she weaves her complex web of relationships, beliefs, values and social mores. An engrossing chronicle. I turned the last pages of this real tour de force, with its ingenious mix of turbulent private lives and fascinating background material, with real regret, and its aroma has haunted me for days Penelope Hughes-Hallett

Provides compelling insights into the extraordinary lives of the four Macdonald sisters Accessibly but informatively written, this is an intriguing journey of an obscure family of women on their way to a life of splendour and influence Time Out

A Circle of Sisters wears its learning lightly, weaving the supporting evidence into the fabric of this curious tale of four sisters who fortuitously made rather good marriages This is a book with fascinating range and admirable control definitely recommended Penelope Lively, Daily Mail

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Judith Flanders is a writer and journalist. A Circle of Sisters is her first book. She is currently working on her next book, on domestic life in the nineteenth century. She lives in London.

Alice Kipling, Georgiana Burne-Jones,
Agnes Poynter and Louisa Baldwin

JUDITH FLANDERS

PENGUIN BOOKS

PENGUIN BOOKS

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First published by Viking 2001
Published in Penguin Books 2002
12

Copyright Judith Flanders, 2001
All rights reserved

The moral right of the author has been asserted

Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publishers prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser

ISBN: 978-0-14-1935256

For F.M.T.

Self & Family, Edward Burne-Jones (Private collection. Photo:reserved) 112

William and faney Morris, Edward Burne-Jones (Peter Nahum, Leicester Galleries, London) 113

Maria Zambaco and Self, Edward Burne-Jones (Sothebys Picture Library, London) 120

A letter from Edward Burne-Jones with caricatures of himself and the cleaning lady, 1890s (Photo:reserved) 166

A wood-carver, John Lockwood Kipling, Simla, 1870 (Fotomas) 190

Kipling as seen by his father, 1899 (Princeton University Library) 294

Every effort has been made to contact all copyright holders. The publishers will be glad to correct in future editions any error or omission brought to their attention.

I would like to thank the following for their help in writing this book: Juliet Annan, Meryl Macdonald Bendle, John Christian, Robert Cohen, John Dee, Peter Funnell, Robin Gibson, Charlotte Greig, Tonie and Valmai Holt, Alison Inglis, Grinne Kelly, Sharad Keskar, Andrew Kidd (who came up with the title), Jeffery Lewins, Lisa Lewis, Andrew Lycett, Helen Macdonald, Sara Marafini, Fiona Markham, Jan Marsh, Douglas Matthews, David Miller, John Radcliffe, Charles Saumarez-Smith, John Singleton, John Slater, Fergal Tobin, Anya Waddington and Christopher Walker. Bob Davenport, by his sympathetic and intelligent editing, made every paragraph read more smoothly.

I am indebted to the following individuals, institutions and libraries: the Bodleian Library; Brompton Cemetery; the British Library; the Hon. Simon Howard, Castle Howard, for permission to quote from the papers of the 9th Earl and Countess of Carlisle, with special thanks to Alison Brisby and Chris Ridgway; the Carl A. Kroch Library, Cornell University; Edinburgh University; Eton College; the Fitzwilliam Museum; the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin, in particular Steve Lawson; the Houghton Library, Harvard University; the Huntington Library; the John Rylands Library, Manchester University; the Kipling Society; the Library of Congress; the London Library; McGill University Library; the National Gallery; the National Portrait Gallery; the National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty, for permission to quote from the works of Rudyard Kipling; the Pitt-Rivers Museum, in particular Elizabeth Edwards; the Probate Office; the Public Record Office of Northern Ireland; Queens University, Belfast; the Royal Academy; the Royal Institute of British Architects; the Tate Gallery; the University of Birmingham; the University of British Columbia; University College London; the University of Sussex, especially Elizabeth Inglis; A. P. Watt; the Worcester Public Record Office. I am also indebted to the two individuals who allowed me access to their collections who wish to remain anonymous.