Julia Kavanagh

Julia Kavanagh (7 January 1824 – 28 October 1877) was an Irish novelist, born at Thurles in County Tipperary, Ireland—then part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. Her numerous contributions to literature have classified her as one of the non-canonical minor novelists of the Victorian period (1837–1901). Although she is mainly known for the novel and tales she wrote, she also published important non-fiction works that explored the theme of female political, moral and philosophical contributions to society. The appeal of her works is represented by the fact that several of her works have been translated into French, German, Italian and Swedish. Her texts also reached North America, where some of her works appeared in ''Littell's Living Age'', an American magazine. Moreover, she was known to celebrated writers of domestic fiction such as Charles Dickens.

Biography

Born in Thurles, a small town in Munster, Ireland, Julia was the only child of Morgan Kavanagh (died 1874), author of various philological works and some poems, and Bridget Kavanagh (née Fitzpatrick). On 9 January she was baptized in the "Big Chapel," a Catholic church, where the clerk misspelled her name as "Cavanah." Before she was a year old, her family moved to London, and soon after to Paris. Julia spent several years of her early life with her parents in Paris, laying the foundations for a mastery of the French language and gaining insight into French modes of thought, eventually perfected by her later frequent and long residences in France. Her father, Morgan, was a language teacher and he also published books of poetry, novels, and several works on philology. An attempt to capitalize on his daughter's literary fame by adding her as co-author to one of his published novels brought Julia much annoyance.

Kavanagh's literary career began in 1844 at the age of 20, when she moved with her mother, after separating from her father in France. John Sutherland. "Kavanagh" in ''Companion to Victorian Literature''. Stanford University Press, 1989. Thereafter she supported herself and her almost blind mother, Bridget (a lifelong companion), with her writing career. In June 1850, she requested to meet Charlotte Brontë, who later described her as 'a little, almost dwarfish figure to which even I had to look down harlotte Brontë was less than five feet tall- not deformed - that is - not hunchbacked but long-armed and with a large head and (at first sight) a strange face.' Charlotte Brontë. "To Ellen Nussey 2 June 1850 in ''Letters of Charlotte Brontë: Volume Two 1848-1851''. Ed. Margaret Smith. Oxford University Press, 2000 At first she started to write small essays and tales for journals and newspapers. Among the different journals she wrote for were ''Chambers Edinburgh Journal, Household Words, All the Year Round, The Month, People's Journal, Popular Record, Temple Bar,'' and ''Argosy''. Once she had acquired some reputation she started to write her own books. Her first book was ''Three Paths'' (1847), a story for the young; but her first work that attracted notice was ''Madeleine, a Tale of Auvergne'' (1848), a story of "heroic charity and living faith founded on fact".

Julia and her mother were again living in Paris from the early 1860s, but moved to Rouen and then to Nice. Julia died after a fall in Nice