Grace Darling, Victorian Superstar
I think the Mitford family is famous in England. In the US, where I live, they’re a bit obscure. Or maybe they’ve just become obscure, I don’t know. It’s too bad because Jessica Mitford is one of the greatest, funniest writers ever. She just has such a keen eye for the telling detail!
Plus, she makes you want to hang out with her. Unless that’s just me. You know that game where you choose four famous people living or dead you’d want to invite to a dinner party? She is so on my list.
My favorites by her are probably her memoirs: Hons and Rebels
But Grace Had an English Heart: The Story of Grace Darling, Heroine and Victorian Superstar has a special place in my heart as a small book that Mitford wrote simply because she thought it was interesting. And boy, is it interesting! Grace Darling was a Victorian lighthouse-keeper’s daughter who saved a bunch men from drowning by rowing out with her father to save them in a storm and became, much to her dismay, a celebrity.
The book deftly reviews the small amount of information we actually have about Grace and her life, but more than that, it’s a story about celebrity and Victorians: what Grace represented to them, what they needed her for and what they chose to ignore.
My favorite bit is a quote from a letter she wrote to her somewhat unwanted “patron,” the Duke of Northumberland: “I have not got married yet, [and here she had first added] for they say the man is master, and there is much talk about bad masters; [but erasing this she substituted] for I have heard people say there is luck in leisure.”
There’s so much there, about the reality of being a poor woman in Victorian England, the control you did and didn’t have over your life, and what you were and weren’t supposed to feel and say and do.
And then here are a couple of funny bits:
[On poetic odes to Grace]: “The poem comparesfavorably to Wordsworth’s appalling effort of a hundred lines, partly because it is so much shorter.”
[On other lighthouse-keepers' daughters]: Ida Lewis’s “fourth rescue was that of a man who had also wrecked somebody else’s boat; the owner sent Ida a message to the effect that he would gladly have given her fifty dollars if she had let the fellow drown.”
And if you like the book, you can also buy a recording of Jessica Mitford singing “The Ballad of Grace Darling”! How freaking cool is that? She recorded it along with “Maxwell’s Silver Hammer” as a fundraiser for something or other–according to Wikipedia, “In addition to writing and activism, Mitford tried her hand at music as singer for ‘Decca and the Dectones,’ a cowbell and kazoo orchestra. She performed at numerous benefits and opened for Cyndi Lauper on the roof of the Virgin Records store in San Francisco.” Basically, Jessica Mitford is the coolest person ever!
You have a limited amount of time, so why spend it reading about things that suck or are only kind of okay? Favorite thing EVER is not a review site. We're unrepentant fans, and this is the stuff we love. Hope you like gushing, because we're about to embarrass ourselves.
She does sound pretty bitchin’. Did you visit her house while you were in Town?
Whoa. I had no clue about either Mitford or Grace Darling. I must investigate further!
Do you think they will make a film? I bet it could be amazing. And star Saoirse Ronan.
Requested from the library! Hons and Rebels (whoops… why’d they feel the need to rename it to Daughters and Rebels?) was awesome.
She sounds fab.