Fanny Kemble (1809–1893)
Author of Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation in 1838-1839
About the Author
Image credit: From "Records of a Girlhood" by Frances Anne Kemble
Works by Fanny Kemble
Associated Works
The Assassin's Cloak: An Anthology of the World's Greatest Diarists (2000) — Contributor, some editions — 624 copies, 9 reviews
Poems Between Women: Four Centuries of Love, Romantic Friendship, and Desire (1997) — Contributor — 96 copies, 1 review
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Other names
- Kemble, Frances Anne (birth)
Butler, F. A. - Birthdate
- 1809-11-27
- Date of death
- 1893-01-15
- Gender
- female
- Occupations
- activist
writer
playwright
memoirist
public speaker - Relationships
- Hatton, Ann Julia (aunt)
Kemble, Adelaide (sibling)
Leigh, Frances Butler (child)
Wister, Sarah Butler (child)
Wister, Owen (grandchild) - Short biography
- Frances Anne "Fanny" Kemble was born into the First Family of the British theatre. Her parents were the actors Charles Kemble and his wife Maria Theresa Kemble, and Sarah Siddons was her aunt. Fanny was educated in France and made her own stage debut in 1829 at Covent Garden in London, where she was a smash hit in the role of Shakespeare's Juliet. Fanny became an icon of the British stage and achieved international stardom on her 1832 tour of the East Coast of the USA. In 1834, she married Pierce Mease Butler, an American planter and politician, and retired from her theatrical career. She then became a best-selling author when her "Journal by Frances Anne Butler" appeared in 1835. The book scandalized American readers with her frank opinions about her adopted country. In 1847, Fanny separated from her husband and returned to the stage to make a living. She had great success as a Shakespearean reader rather than acting in plays, and toured the country. She and her husband divorced in 1849; Butler kept custody of their two daughters and Fanny was not allowed to see them until they each reached age 21. Fanny was an outspoken abolitionist. She wrote "Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation in 1838-1839," an account of life on her husband's plantations in the Sea Islands, with passionate commentary against slavery. It could not be published until after the start of the Civil War, for fear of Butler's reaction and alienating her daughters. Fanny continued to tour until her death in 1893 in London.
- Nationality
- UK
- Birthplace
- London, England, UK
- Place of death
- London, England, UK
- Burial location
- Kensal Green Cemetery, London, England, UK
- Associated Place (for map)
- London, England, UK
Members
Reviews
http://nhw.livejournal.com/588685.html
Published in 1863, this is a series of letters from Kemble to her friend E[lizabeth Sedgwick] describing her four months as the wife of a Georgian plantation owner, and going into considerable detail about the living conditions of the slaves. It is horrific stuff, an eloquent argument against slavery, published twenty-five years after the event in a deliberate attempt to undermine British sympathy for the Confederacy in the middle of the Civil War. I show more haven't read any of the editorials in the Times that she is reacting to, but I do remember the right-wing British press on apartheid, Northern Ireland, and (more dimly) Rhodesia. Sadly, I have little difficulty in imagining pompous British journalists of the day trying to reassure their readers that slavery was actually a very good deal for the slaves. (It is also a shameful fact, remembered by few, that Irish nationalists of the 1860s sympathised with the Confederacy too, as they sympathised with the Boers at the end of the century.)
Bearing in mind that the author was an actress, I was alert for clues that the letters might have been somewhat revised for publication to put her case in the best possible light. But I ended up doubting that this was the case - there are enough internal repetitions that a good editor would have taken out to ensure a better flow of the narrative. I am sure that she did delete certain more personal details about her husband and daughters, but I feel that otherwise this is pretty much the horrified account of a thirty-year-old woman trying (and ultimately failing) to come to terms with the society she had married into, rather then her fifty-five-year-old self retrospectively justifying it; a famous and glamorous English actress, who had married a rich and charming young American and only gradually come to a realisation of exactly how his family's fortunes were sustained.
Thank heavens there were people like her prepared to bear witness to what slavery actually meant. show less
Published in 1863, this is a series of letters from Kemble to her friend E[lizabeth Sedgwick] describing her four months as the wife of a Georgian plantation owner, and going into considerable detail about the living conditions of the slaves. It is horrific stuff, an eloquent argument against slavery, published twenty-five years after the event in a deliberate attempt to undermine British sympathy for the Confederacy in the middle of the Civil War. I show more haven't read any of the editorials in the Times that she is reacting to, but I do remember the right-wing British press on apartheid, Northern Ireland, and (more dimly) Rhodesia. Sadly, I have little difficulty in imagining pompous British journalists of the day trying to reassure their readers that slavery was actually a very good deal for the slaves. (It is also a shameful fact, remembered by few, that Irish nationalists of the 1860s sympathised with the Confederacy too, as they sympathised with the Boers at the end of the century.)
Bearing in mind that the author was an actress, I was alert for clues that the letters might have been somewhat revised for publication to put her case in the best possible light. But I ended up doubting that this was the case - there are enough internal repetitions that a good editor would have taken out to ensure a better flow of the narrative. I am sure that she did delete certain more personal details about her husband and daughters, but I feel that otherwise this is pretty much the horrified account of a thirty-year-old woman trying (and ultimately failing) to come to terms with the society she had married into, rather then her fifty-five-year-old self retrospectively justifying it; a famous and glamorous English actress, who had married a rich and charming young American and only gradually come to a realisation of exactly how his family's fortunes were sustained.
Thank heavens there were people like her prepared to bear witness to what slavery actually meant. show less
Important reading.
How on earth could the slave owners and overseers not realize that in listening to the complaints of the slaves, this woman was actually doing the owners themselves a favor -rather than increasing discontent, listening gave an outlet to those slaves who confided in her, thus actually decreasing their discontent by making them feel heard, and actually adding years to the lives of the masters and overseers. Had the slaves not felt listened to, they might have slit the show more throats of all the white men on the plantation, despite (or because of) the repressive conditions. How on earth could they not realize that their very deafness and blindness to their cruelty increased the risk of revolt? Discontent penned up boils over, as the Great Depression showed (which was why we got Social Security, Medica* and Welfare -that, and the fact that FDR did not want the Japanese using segregation and Bread Lines as bad P.R. against US...).
Courage, and hope against hope.
In Service to Community,
MEOW Date: 27 August 12,014 H.E. (Holocene/Human Era) show less
How on earth could the slave owners and overseers not realize that in listening to the complaints of the slaves, this woman was actually doing the owners themselves a favor -rather than increasing discontent, listening gave an outlet to those slaves who confided in her, thus actually decreasing their discontent by making them feel heard, and actually adding years to the lives of the masters and overseers. Had the slaves not felt listened to, they might have slit the show more throats of all the white men on the plantation, despite (or because of) the repressive conditions. How on earth could they not realize that their very deafness and blindness to their cruelty increased the risk of revolt? Discontent penned up boils over, as the Great Depression showed (which was why we got Social Security, Medica* and Welfare -that, and the fact that FDR did not want the Japanese using segregation and Bread Lines as bad P.R. against US...).
Courage, and hope against hope.
In Service to Community,
MEOW Date: 27 August 12,014 H.E. (Holocene/Human Era) show less
Fanny Kemble was a very famous 19th century British actress and author who traveled the world, married one of her groupies who inherited a plantation with hundreds of slaves, divorced him and became an outspoken advocate of abolition. She belonged to a theatrical family; her father, aunt and uncle were famous actors and her sister was an opera singer. Fanny kept extensive journals commenting on everything. Her diary [b:Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation 1838-1839|9844407|Journal show more of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation 1838-1839|Frances Anne Kemble|http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41eOmqx7TnL._SL75_.jpg|14735237] was published before the Civil War, she spoke against slavery and donated money to the abolitionist movement.
Rather than read one of the biographies like [b:Fanny Kemble's Civil War|220087|Fanny Kemble's Civil War|Catherine Clinton|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172807759s/220087.jpg|2290419], I thought that I would go straight to the source and read her journals. I expected her to write in a Victorian style so that wasn't a surprise but every couple of pages she goes off on some tangent. She would see a sunrise and then go on and on about it actually saying nothing at all. Three more pages of substance and then a page on the moonlight, two pages on ocean waves, a page on rose petals. After a while these "spells" got so boring that when I recognized the beginning of one of them I would skip a page.
Although her memoirs were published many years after they were written, the author blanked out all the names of people. All men, except her father and a couple of famous people who were mentioned in passing (like Lord Byron and presidents of the U.S.) were called Mr.---- and all women were Miss---- or Mrs.----. So it was impossible to keep track of who was present or who was speaking. So many paragraphs look like: Mr. and Mrs.---- joined us for dinner but Mr.---- declined our invitation. Mr.---- brought me a nosegay. Mr.---- sang for us. As he was leaving Mr.---- invited me to go riding but father and I had a prior appointment with Mr.----."
Fanny Kemble lived an intense and interesting life but, unless you have a specific interest in reading her journals as she wrote them, I would recommend reading an edited version like Catherine Clinton's [b:Fanny Kemble's Journals|1042570|Fanny Kemble's Journals|Fanny Kemble|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1180458972s/1042570.jpg|1028971] show less
Rather than read one of the biographies like [b:Fanny Kemble's Civil War|220087|Fanny Kemble's Civil War|Catherine Clinton|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172807759s/220087.jpg|2290419], I thought that I would go straight to the source and read her journals. I expected her to write in a Victorian style so that wasn't a surprise but every couple of pages she goes off on some tangent. She would see a sunrise and then go on and on about it actually saying nothing at all. Three more pages of substance and then a page on the moonlight, two pages on ocean waves, a page on rose petals. After a while these "spells" got so boring that when I recognized the beginning of one of them I would skip a page.
Although her memoirs were published many years after they were written, the author blanked out all the names of people. All men, except her father and a couple of famous people who were mentioned in passing (like Lord Byron and presidents of the U.S.) were called Mr.---- and all women were Miss---- or Mrs.----. So it was impossible to keep track of who was present or who was speaking. So many paragraphs look like: Mr. and Mrs.---- joined us for dinner but Mr.---- declined our invitation. Mr.---- brought me a nosegay. Mr.---- sang for us. As he was leaving Mr.---- invited me to go riding but father and I had a prior appointment with Mr.----."
Fanny Kemble lived an intense and interesting life but, unless you have a specific interest in reading her journals as she wrote them, I would recommend reading an edited version like Catherine Clinton's [b:Fanny Kemble's Journals|1042570|Fanny Kemble's Journals|Fanny Kemble|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1180458972s/1042570.jpg|1028971] show less
Fanny Kemble was a very famous 19th century British actress and author who traveled the world, married one of her groupies who inherited a plantation with hundreds of slaves, divorced him and became an outspoken advocate of abolition. She belonged to a theatrical family; her father, aunt and uncle were famous actors and her sister was an opera singer. Fanny kept extensive journals commenting on everything. Her diary [b:Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation 1838-1839|9844407|Journal show more of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation 1838-1839|Frances Anne Kemble|http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41eOmqx7TnL._SL75_.jpg|14735237] was published before the Civil War, she spoke against slavery and donated money to the abolitionist movement.
Rather than read one of the biographies like [b:Fanny Kemble's Civil War|220087|Fanny Kemble's Civil War|Catherine Clinton|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172807759s/220087.jpg|2290419], I thought that I would go straight to the source and read her journals. I expected her to write in a Victorian style so that wasn't a surprise but every couple of pages she goes off on some tangent. She would see a sunrise and then go on and on about it actually saying nothing at all. Three more pages of substance and then a page on the moonlight, two pages on ocean waves, a page on rose petals. After a while these "spells" got so boring that when I recognized the beginning of one of them I would skip a page.
Although her memoirs were published many years after they were written, the author blanked out all the names of people. All men, except her father and a couple of famous people who were mentioned in passing (like Lord Byron and presidents of the U.S.) were called Mr.---- and all women were Miss---- or Mrs.----. So it was impossible to keep track of who was present or who was speaking. So many paragraphs look like: Mr. and Mrs.---- joined us for dinner but Mr.---- declined our invitation. Mr.---- brought me a nosegay. Mr.---- sang for us. As he was leaving Mr.---- invited me to go riding but father and I had a prior appointment with Mr.----."
Fanny Kemble lived an intense and interesting life but, unless you have a specific interest in reading her journals as she wrote them, I would recommend reading an edited version like Catherine Clinton's [b:Fanny Kemble's Journals|1042570|Fanny Kemble's Journals|Fanny Kemble|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1180458972s/1042570.jpg|1028971] show less
Rather than read one of the biographies like [b:Fanny Kemble's Civil War|220087|Fanny Kemble's Civil War|Catherine Clinton|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172807759s/220087.jpg|2290419], I thought that I would go straight to the source and read her journals. I expected her to write in a Victorian style so that wasn't a surprise but every couple of pages she goes off on some tangent. She would see a sunrise and then go on and on about it actually saying nothing at all. Three more pages of substance and then a page on the moonlight, two pages on ocean waves, a page on rose petals. After a while these "spells" got so boring that when I recognized the beginning of one of them I would skip a page.
Although her memoirs were published many years after they were written, the author blanked out all the names of people. All men, except her father and a couple of famous people who were mentioned in passing (like Lord Byron and presidents of the U.S.) were called Mr.---- and all women were Miss---- or Mrs.----. So it was impossible to keep track of who was present or who was speaking. So many paragraphs look like: Mr. and Mrs.---- joined us for dinner but Mr.---- declined our invitation. Mr.---- brought me a nosegay. Mr.---- sang for us. As he was leaving Mr.---- invited me to go riding but father and I had a prior appointment with Mr.----."
Fanny Kemble lived an intense and interesting life but, unless you have a specific interest in reading her journals as she wrote them, I would recommend reading an edited version like Catherine Clinton's [b:Fanny Kemble's Journals|1042570|Fanny Kemble's Journals|Fanny Kemble|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1180458972s/1042570.jpg|1028971] show less
Lists
You May Also Like
Associated Authors
Statistics
- Works
- 28
- Also by
- 7
- Members
- 402
- Popularity
- #60,415
- Rating
- 4.0
- Reviews
- 6
- ISBNs
- 54
