Nora Perry (1831 – May 13, 1896) was an American poet, newspaper correspondent, and writer of juvenile stories, and for some years,
Boston
Boston is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and Financial centre, financial center of New England, a region of the Northeas ...
correspondent of the ''
Chicago Tribune
The ''Chicago Tribune'' is an American daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Founded in 1847, it was formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper", a slogan from which its once integrated WGN (AM), WGN radio and ...
''. Her verse was collected in ''After the Ball'' (1875), ''Her Lover's Friend'' (1879), ''New Songs and Ballads'' (1886), ''Legends and Lyrics'' (1890). Her fiction, chiefly juvenile, included ''The Tragedy of the Unexpected'' (1880), stories; ''For a Woman'' (1885), a novel; ''A Book of Love Stories'' (1881); ''A Flock of Girls and their Friends'' (1887); ''The New Year's Call'' (1903); and many other volumes.
Early years and education
Nora Perry was born in
Dudley, Massachusetts
Dudley is a town in Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 11,921 at the 2020 census.
History
Dudley was first settled in 1714 and was officially incorporated in 1732. The town was named for landholders Paul and Wil ...
, in 1831. Her parents removed to
Providence, Rhode Island
Providence () is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Rhode Island, most populous city of the U.S. state of Rhode Island. The county seat of Providence County, Rhode Island, Providence County, it is o ...
, in her childhood. Her father was engaged in mercantile business there. She was educated at home and in private schools. She received a varied and liberal training in many lines. Her first piece, "The Shipwreck" was written when Perry was eight years old.
Career

At the age of eighteen, she began to write for publication as a newspaper correspondent. Her first serial story, "Rosalind Newcomb", was published in ''Harper's Magazine'' in 1859–60. Much of her time in later years was spent in
Boston
Boston is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and Financial centre, financial center of New England, a region of the Northeas ...
, where she wrote society letters for the ''
Chicago Tribune
The ''Chicago Tribune'' is an American daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Founded in 1847, it was formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper", a slogan from which its once integrated WGN (AM), WGN radio and ...
'' and also became Boston correspondent to the most influential paper in
Rhode Island
Rhode Island ( ) is a state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders Connecticut to its west; Massachusetts to its north and east; and the Atlantic Ocean to its south via Rhode Island Sound and Block Is ...
, the ''Providence Journal''. In 1859, there appeared in the Boston and other papers, printed, reprinted, copied one from the other, a touching poem called "After the Ball". Ever since its first appearance in its fugitive state, the name of Nora Perry became familiar to readers.
"After the Ball" (1859, ''Atlantic Monthly'') and "Tying Her Bonnet under Her Chin" (1859, ''National Era'') were Perry's best poems of the 1850s. By the mid-1860s, she favored penning stories for girls.
"After the Ball", which was sometimes printed under the title of "Madge and Maud", was afterwards incorporated in a book with other poems, published in Boston in 1874, but the many verses that Perry wrote since that time, never faded from the memory of her readers the picture of the two maidens, who,—
At intervals, she was in the habit of collecting her magazine contributions and issuing them in book form, such as are often classed as "summer reading". In this shape appeared in 1880 ''The Tragedy of the Unexpected and Other Stories'', which actually was not a tragedy, but a pleasant summer idyl. In 1881 followed a ''Book of Love Stories'', the very title of which endeared it to all the youthful readers wanting "something new" that did not require too much thought. In 1885, she published the novelette ''For a Woman''; in 1886, a volume of ''New Songs and Ballads''; and in 1887, ''A Flock of Girls''. In ''New Songs and Ballads'' (1886), there were several poems of high literary merit, though none held the sympathies of its readers as completely as "After the Ball"; among the best of these were "Her Lover's Friend", "Lady Wentworth", and a piece entitled "The Maid of Honor".
Her verse is collected in ''After the Ball'' (1875), ''Her Lover's Friend'' (1879), ''New Songs and Ballads'' (1886), ''Legends and Lyrics'' (1890). Her fiction, chiefly juvenile, includes ''The Tragedy of the Unexpected'' (1880), stories; ''For a Woman'' (1885), a novel; ''A Book of Love Stories'' (1881); ''A Flock of Girls and their Friends'' (1887); ''The New Year's Call'' (1903); ''Youngest Miss Lorton, and Other Stories'' (1889), ''Brave Girls'' (1889), and many other volumes. These were briskly told and, like her verses, appealed to the sentiment of the broader reading public.
Personal life
Perry was a friend of
Sarah Helen Whitman
Sarah Helen Power Whitman (January 19, 1803 – June 27, 1878) was an American poet, essayist, transcendentalist, spiritualist and a romantic interest of Edgar Allan Poe.
Early life
Whitman was born in Providence, Rhode Island on January 19, ...
. Perry died at Dudley on May 13, 1896.
Style and themes
Although her writing was amenable to even the most prudish reader, Perry abstained from any obvious moral purpose in her stories. Nevertheless, her work was of the moral order, and showed high thinking and careful polish. Her eulogy on
Vasco Nunez de Balboa Vasco may refer to:
People Given name Middle Ages
* Vasco da Gama (c. 1460s–1524), Portuguese explorer
* Vasco Núñez de Balboa (1475–1519), Spanish conquistador
* Vasco Fernandes Coutinho, captain of Espírito Santo (1490–1561), Portuguese ...
, first European to see the
Pacific Ocean
The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five Borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is ...
from the isthmus of what is today Panama, exemplifies her poetic style. Her works of fiction were "briskly told" and, like her verses, appealed to the sentiment of the broader reading public.
Selected works
* ''For a woman: A novel ...''
* ''A book of love stories''
* ''Lady Wentworth'', 1857
* ''Letter to Mrs. Sargent. Providence, RI. 1876 Mar. 22.''
* ''Bessie's trials at boarding-school'', 1876
* ''Dolly's kettledrum'', 1883
* ''The children's cherry feast'', 1886
* ''For a woman'', 1886
* ''A school-girl's pleasure-book'', 1888
* ''The youngest Miss Lorton : and other stories'', 1888
* ''Another flock of girls'', 1890
* ''A rosebud garden of girls'', 1892
* ''After the ball; Her lover's friend'', 1896
* ''Three little daughters of the revolution'', 1898
* ''La belle-mère de May-Bartlett'', 1898
* ''Cottage neighbors'', 1899
* ''That little Smith girl'', 1899
* ''May Bartlett's stepmother'', 1900
* ''Ju Ju's Christmas party'', 1901
* ''Margy's two troubles; and other stories'', 1907
Notes
References
Attribution
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Perry, Nora
1831 births
1896 deaths
19th-century American women writers
19th-century American novelists
People from Dudley, Massachusetts
American women novelists
Novelists from Massachusetts
American newspaper reporters and correspondents
19th-century American poets
American children's writers
American women poets
American women children's writers
Burials at Swan Point Cemetery