Dorothy Bussy (1865–1960)
Autore di Olivia
Sull'Autore
Nota di disambiguazione:
(eng) Do not combine with the LT entry for Olivia. She was not known under that name.
Opere di Dorothy Bussy
André Gide, Dorothy Bussy. Correspondance. Tome 1/3 : Juin 1918 - Décembre 1924 (1979) — Autore — 2 copie
Eugene Delacroix 1 copia
André Gide, Dorothy Bussy. Correspondance, tome 2/3 : Janvier 1925 - Novembre 1936 (1981) — Autore — 1 copia
André Gide, Dorothy Bussy. Correspondance. Tome 3/3 : Janvier 1937 - Janvier 1951 (1982) — Autore — 1 copia
Opere correlate
Etichette
Informazioni generali
- Altri nomi
- Strachey Bussy, Dorothy
Bussy, Dorothy - Data di nascita
- 1865-07-24
- Data di morte
- 1960-05-01
- Sesso
- female
- Nazionalità
- UK
- Luogo di morte
- Fontainebleau, Seine-et-Marne, Île-de-France, France
- Luogo di residenza
- London, England, UK
Fontainebleau, Seine-et-Marne, Île-de-France, France - Istruzione
- Allenswood Academy, England, UK
Marie Souvestre School, Les Ruches, Fontainebleau, France - Attività lavorative
- novelist
translator
letter writer
teacher - Relazioni
- Strachey, Lytton (brother)
Strachey, James (brother)
Strachey, Marjorie (sister)
Strachey, Ray (sister-in-law) - Breve biografia
- Dorothy Strachey Bussy was one of 10 children of Lt.-Gen. Sir Richard Strachey, an officer in the British colonial armies and his wife Jane Grant, a leader in the women's suffrage movement. She was educated at Marie Souvestre's school for girls in Fontainebleau, France, and later in Allenswood Academy, near London. She became a teacher at Allenswood, where one of her students was the young Eleanor Roosevelt, on whom she had a strong influence. In 1903, Dorothy married Simon Bussy, a French painter five years her junior. Dorothy Bussy anonymously published one novel, Olivia (1949), printed by the Hogarth Press, the publishing house founded by Leonard and Virginia Woolf.
- Nota di disambiguazione
- Do not combine with the LT entry for Olivia. She was not known under that name.
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Statistiche
- Opere
- 5
- Opere correlate
- 11
- Utenti
- 415
- Popolarità
- #58,725
- Voto
- 3.6
- Recensioni
- 7
- ISBN
- 26
- Lingue
- 5
“Was this stab in my heart, this rapture, really mine or had I merely read about it? For every feeling, every vicissitude of my passion, there would spring into my mind a quotation from the poets. Shakespeare or Donne or Heine had the exact phrase for it. Comforting, perhaps, but enraging too. Nothing ever seemed spontaneously my own.”
A woman recollects the final year of her education, a year when she discovered life at its fullest, found passion and in a sense, herself.
Olivia is sixteen when she is sent to Les Avons a finishing school near Paris, run by two mademoiselles. This is a school of an entirely different kind. It is a school where there are few rules, where laughter and passionate discussion are actively encouraged. Olivia revels in this atmosphere so unlike anything she has experienced before.
However, the freedom and fun of Les Avons is superficial, beneath the surface are raw emotions, jealousies and destructive allegiances.
“How hard it is to kill hope! Time after time, one thinks one has trodden it down, stamped it to death. Time after time, like a noxious insect, it begins to stir again, it shivers back again into a faint tremulous life. Once more it worms its way into one’s heart, to instil its poison, to gnaw away the solid hard foundations of life and leave in their place the hollow phantom of illusion.”
The school is run by Mademoiselles Julie and Cara, once so close, the two are each acting against the other. Each of the headmistresses have their circle of acolytes – powerful emotions have been unleashed beneath the roofs of this French school. Olivia doesn’t really understand the nuances of everything that is going on at Les Avons, the tension between Julie and Cara, is a puzzle to her but she has no understanding for what their relationship might have been. Olivia; fresh from England is too caught up in a complete infatuation for Mademoiselle Julie.
“Love has always been the chief business of my life, the only thing I have thought—no, felt—supremely worth while, and I don’t pretend that this experience was not succeeded by others. But at that time, I was innocent, with the innocence of ignorance, I didn’t know what was happening to me.”
The girls regularly gather around Mademoiselle Julie for impassioned debate, to present their essays and to hang upon her every word. Olivia waits for the headmistress’s visits to her room, for the slightest look, the touch of her hand.
While Olivia is wrestling with these new and unexpected feelings for her headmistress and making an unexpected friendship with another of Mademoiselle Julie’s favourites, Mademoiselle Cara is plotting one final act of betrayal.
I am surprised that this delicate little novella isn’t better known. I know vintage books brought out a new edition of this one a few years ago, which has hopefully raised its profile a little.… (altro)