Yes, well, perhaps a bit mad of me to think of such another big project, but I’ve been interested in Hamilton’s work for a long time and often toyed with the idea of writing about her. We’ll see how it goes…very early days yet anyway.
Fascinating post, she sounds so interesting & I am looking forward to reading your biography of her! (Plus more snippets here, of course.) I wonder if she had connections with Cambridge women?
Ah, just worked out where I read her name before - did she study at Girton College? She's mentioned in Gill Sutherland's In Search of the New Woman, about careers of former Cambridge students in the chapter 'Impossible for a lady to remain a lady: art, literature and the theatre'.
Hi, no she wasn't educated at Cambridge. She went to a boarding school in Malvern, and then to a German school in Bad Homburg, Germany; in her autobiography she talks of her education being neglected. She then worked as a teacher, and Sutherland suggests that "hating teaching and finding that lack of any higher education was becoming an increasing barrier, [she] turned to acting" (p. 59). However, according to Hamilton's autobiography she already had ambitions to be an actor when she left school at 18, so that doesn't support the idea that she only turned to it because she couldn't get on as a teacher.
Crumbs - lots more research to do! But she does sound fascinating.
Yes, well, perhaps a bit mad of me to think of such another big project, but I’ve been interested in Hamilton’s work for a long time and often toyed with the idea of writing about her. We’ll see how it goes…very early days yet anyway.
Fascinating post, she sounds so interesting & I am looking forward to reading your biography of her! (Plus more snippets here, of course.) I wonder if she had connections with Cambridge women?
Thanks for the comment! I will keep a look out for links to Cambridge women, none spring to mind yet.
Ah, just worked out where I read her name before - did she study at Girton College? She's mentioned in Gill Sutherland's In Search of the New Woman, about careers of former Cambridge students in the chapter 'Impossible for a lady to remain a lady: art, literature and the theatre'.
Hi, no she wasn't educated at Cambridge. She went to a boarding school in Malvern, and then to a German school in Bad Homburg, Germany; in her autobiography she talks of her education being neglected. She then worked as a teacher, and Sutherland suggests that "hating teaching and finding that lack of any higher education was becoming an increasing barrier, [she] turned to acting" (p. 59). However, according to Hamilton's autobiography she already had ambitions to be an actor when she left school at 18, so that doesn't support the idea that she only turned to it because she couldn't get on as a teacher.
Ah, I did wonder! All the more impressive that she gave that lecture to the very highbrow academics in 1914.
Cicely also gave a talk to the Cambridge Heretics in 1914, I see. Impressive!
https://heritage.humanists.uk/the-cambridge-heretics/
Thanks very much for the reference! very interesting.