Frances Browne

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FB published from the mid to the late nineteenth century, arousing public interest on account of her blindness. Having begun with poetry, she became best known for fiction—novels and short stories for children and adults—and her famed story collection Granny's Wonderful Chair became a classic.
  • BirthName: Frances Browne
    The correct spelling of her surname is unclear, as she published under both Brown and Browne. The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography gives her name as Browne. FB had a contemporary named Frances Elizabeth Browne , who wrote a book of Poems (1846) and a drama entitled Ruth (1871).
    Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
    University of Alberta Libraries On-line Catalogue. http://www.library.ualberta.ca/.
    OCLC WorldCat. 1992–1998, http://www.oclc.org/firstsearch/content/worldcat/. Accessed 1999.

  • Nicknames: The Blind Girl of Donegal
    The Irish Book Lover. Whyte and Salmond.
    8 (Dec-Jan 1916-17): 49
    ; The Blind Poetess of Ulster
    Allibone, S. Austin, editor. A Critical Dictionary of English Literature and British and American Authors Living and Deceased. Gale Research, 1965.
    ; The Blind Poetess of Donegal
    Sutherland, John, b. 1938. The Stanford Companion to Victorian Fiction. Stanford University Press, 1989.
    Sage, Lorna, editor. The Cambridge Guide to Women’s Writing in English. Cambridge University Press, 1999.

  • Pseudonyms: F. B.
    “Dictionary of Literary Biography online”. Gale Databases: Literature Resource Center-LRC.
    199
    ; F. Browne
    “Dictionary of Literary Biography online”. Gale Databases: Literature Resource Center-LRC.
    199

  • Indexed: Frances Brown
Black and white, head-and-shoulders photograph of Frances Browne, shown at a three quarter turn. She is wearing a dark jacket with a white collar outside it, and large silver hoop earrings. Her straight hair is pulled back and hangs in a long plait down one side.

Milestones

16 January 1816

FB was born at Stranorlar in County Donegal, Ireland, the seventh in a family of twelve children.
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.

By 6 December 1856

FB published with her name her most famous work, Granny's Wonderful Chair and its Tales of Fairy Times, with illustrations by Kenny Meadows and bearing the date 1857.
Athenæum. J. Lection.
1519 (1856): 1497
“Dictionary of Literary Biography online”. Gale Databases: Literature Resource Center-LRC.
199

1875

FB issued with the Religious Tract Society a didactic volume entitled The Nearest Neighbour and Other Stories, apparently her last publication before her death.
“Dictionary of Literary Biography online”. Gale Databases: Literature Resource Center-LRC.
199

21 August 1879

FB died of apoplexy (that is a stroke) at her home at 19 St John's Grove, Richmond, Surrey.
The Dictionary of Literary Biography gives a very different account of her death, dating it as 25 August 1879 and listing the cause as heart disease.
“Dictionary of Literary Biography online”. Gale Databases: Literature Resource Center-LRC.
199
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.

Biography

Birth and Background

16 January 1816

FB was born at Stranorlar in County Donegal, Ireland, the seventh in a family of twelve children.
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.

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