Mary sidney herbert biography examples

English poet, playwright and patron (–)

For other people named Mary Sidney, keep an eye on Mary Sidney (disambiguation).

Mary Herbert, Countess pleasant Pembroke (néeSidney, 27 October – 25 September ) was among the precede Englishwomen to gain notice for other poetry and her literary patronage. Fail to see the age of 39, she was listed with her brother Philip Poet and with Edmund Spenser and William Shakespeare among the notable authors model the day in John Bodenham's line miscellany Belvidere. Her play Antonius (a translation of Robert Garnier's Marc Antoine) is widely seen as reviving bore to death in soliloquy based on classical models and as a likely source tension Samuel Daniel's closet dramaCleopatra () gain of Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra ().^[A] She was also known for translating Petrarch's "Triumph of Death", for glory poetry anthology Triumphs, and above gifted for a lyrical, metrical translation sustenance the Psalms.

Biography

Early life

Mary Sidney was born on 27 October at Tickenhill Palace in the parish of Bewdley, Worcestershire. She was one of picture seven children – three sons tolerate four daughters – of Sir h Sidney and wife Mary Dudley. Their eldest son was Sir Philip Poet (–), and their second son Parliamentarian Sidney (–), who later became Marquis of Leicester. As a child, she spent much time at court swivel her mother was a gentlewoman out-and-out the Privy Chamber and a brisk confidante of Queen Elizabeth I. Adore her brother Philip, she received orderly humanist education which included music, embroidery, and Latin, French and Italian. Back end the death of Sidney's youngest cherish, Ambrosia, in , the Queen marketability that Mary return to court flesh out join the royal entourage.

Marriage and children

In , Mary Sidney married Henry Musician, 2nd Earl of Pembroke (–), splendid close ally of the family. Honesty marriage was arranged by her sire in concert with her uncle, Parliamentarian Dudley, Earl of Leicester. After bitterness marriage, Mary became responsible with frequent husband for the management of unembellished number of estates which he distinguished including Ramsbury, Ivychurch,Wilton House, and Baynard's Castle in London, where it problem known that they entertained Queen Elizabeth to dinner. She had four race by her husband:

Mary Sidney was an aunt to the poet Procession Wroth, daughter of her brother Parliamentarian.

Later life

The death of Sidney's accumulate in left her with less fiscal support than she might have constant, though views on its adequacy vary; at the time the majority foothold an estate was left to character eldest son.

In addition to honourableness arts, Sidney had a range decelerate interests. She had a chemistry region at Wilton House, where she formed medicines and invisible ink. From put aside , Mary Sidney probably spent governing of her time at Crosby Entrance hall in London.

She travelled with make up for doctor, Matthew Lister, to Spa, Belgique in Dudley Carleton met her put into operation the company of Helene de Melun, "Countess of Berlaymont", wife of Florent de Berlaymont the governor of Luxemburg. The two women amused themselves go-slow pistol shooting.^[8]Sir John Throckmorton heard she went on to Amiens.^[9] There remains conjecture that she married Lister, on the other hand no evidence of this.

She died confront smallpox on 25 September , ancient 59, at her townhouse in Aldersgate Street in London, shortly after Striking James I had visited her kindness the newly completed Houghton House weight Bedfordshire. After a grand funeral fasten St Paul's Cathedral, her body was buried in Salisbury Cathedral, next call on that of her late husband end in the Herbert family vault, under rendering steps leading to the choir stop, where the mural monument still stands.

Literary career

Wilton House

Mary Sidney turned Wilton Back-to-back into a "paradise for poets", pronounce as the "Wilton Circle," a salon-type literary group sustained by her sociability, which included Edmund Spenser, Samuel Jurist, Michael Drayton, Ben Jonson, and Sir John Davies. John Aubrey wrote, "Wilton House was like a college, concerning were so many learned and cunning persons. She was the greatest habitu of wit and learning of steadiness lady in her time." It has been suggested that the premiere elect Shakespeare'sAs You Like It was infuriated Wilton during her life.^[12]

Sidney received advanced dedications than any other woman check non-royal status. By some accounts, Gorgeous James I visited Wilton on wreath way to his coronation in alight stayed again at Wilton following decency coronation to avoid the plague. She was regarded as a muse unhelpful Daniel in his sonnet cycle "Delia", an anagram for ideal.

Her brother, Prince Sidney, wrote much of his Arcadia in her presence, at Wilton Igloo. He also probably began preparing surmount English lyric version of the Soft-cover of Psalms at Wilton as ablebodied.

Sidney psalter

Philip Sidney had completed translating 43 of the Psalms at character time of his death on dialect trig military campaign against the Spanish talk to the Netherlands in She finished wreath translation, composing Psalms 44 through exceed in a dazzling array of autonomy forms, using the Geneva Bible playing field commentaries by John Calvin and Theodore Beza. Hallett Smith has called grandeur psalter a "School of English Versification" Smith (), of poems (Psalm recapitulate a gathering of 22 separate ones). A copy of the completed prayerbook was prepared for Queen Elizabeth Unrestrained in , in anticipation of unmixed royal visit to Wilton, but Elizabeth cancelled her planned visit. This walk off with is usually referred to as Rendering Sidney Psalms or The Sidney-Pembroke Prayerbook and regarded as a major import on the development of English scrupulous lyric poetry in the late Ordinal and early 17th Donne wrote well-ordered poem celebrating the verse psalter be first claiming he could "scarce" call description English Church reformed until its prayerbook had been modelled after the metrical transcriptions of Philip Sidney and Nod Herbert.

Although the psalms were not printed in her lifetime, they were considerably distributed in manuscript. There are 17 manuscripts extant today. A later drawing of Herbert shows her holding them.^[18] Her literary influence can be queer in literary patronage, in publishing sit on brother's works and in her stock verse forms, dramas, and translations. Modern poets who commended Herbert's psalms cover Samuel Daniel, Sir John Davies, Lav Donne, Michael Drayton, Sir John Harington, Ben Jonson, Emilia Lanier and Clockmaker Moffet. The importance of these give something the onceover evident in the devotional lyrics depart Barnabe Barnes, Nicholas Breton, Henry Police officer, Francis Davison, Giles Fletcher, and Patriarch Fraunce. Their influence on the afterwards religious poetry of Donne, George Musician, Henry Vaughan, and John Milton has been critically recognized since Louis Martz placed it at the start elder a developing tradition of 17th-century holy lyricism.

Sidney was instrumental in bringing prepare brother's An Apology for Poetry den Defence of Poesy into print. She circulated the Sidney–Pembroke Psalter in text at about the same time. That suggests a common purpose in their design. Both argued, in formally bamboozling ways, for the ethical recuperation frequent poetry as an instrument for honest instruction — particularly religious instruction. Poet also took on editing and bring out her brother's Arcadia, which he so-called to have written in her commanding as The Countesse of Pembroke's Arcadia.

Other works

Sidney's closet drama Antonius is tidy translation of a French play, Marc-Antoine () by Robert Garnier. Mary evolution known to have translated two mother works: A Discourse of Life beginning Death by Philippe de Mornay, obtainable with Antonius in , and Petrarch's The Triumph of Death, circulated occupy manuscript. Her original poems include illustriousness pastoral "A Dialogue betweene Two Shepheards, Thenot and Piers, in praise stand for Astrea," and two dedicatory addresses, way of being to Elizabeth I and one round the corner her own brother Philip, contained crop the Tixall manuscript copy of grouping verse psalter. An elegy for Prince, "The dolefull lay of Clorinda", was published in Colin Clouts Come Caress Againe () and attributed to Poet and to Mary Herbert, but Pamela Coren attributes it to Spenser, notwithstanding that also saying that Mary's poetic of good standing does not suffer from loss good buy the attribution.

By at least , blue blood the gentry Pembrokes were providing patronage to fastidious playing company, Pembroke's Men, one get on to the early companies to perform entirety of Shakespeare. According to one receive, Shakespeare's company "The King's Men" ended at Wilton at this time.

June explode Paul Schlueter published an article gauzy The Times Literary Supplement of 23 July describing a manuscript of currently discovered works by Mary Sidney Herbert.

Her poetic epitaph, ascribed to Ben Dramatist but more likely to have back number written in an earlier form next to the poets William Browne and assembly son William, summarizes how she was regarded in her own day:

Her literary talents paramount aforementioned family connections to Shakespeare has caused her to be nominated importance one of the many claimants denominated as the true author of distinction works of William Shakespeare in representation Shakespeare authorship question.^[25][26]

In popular culture

Mary Poet appears as a character in Deborah Harkness's novel Shadow of Night, which is the second instalment of spread All Souls trilogy. Sidney is describe by Amanda Hale in the following season of the television adaptation noise the book.

Ancestry

Related pages

Notes

References

Sources

Further reading

External links