Michael Field

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As MF , Katharine Harris Bradley and Edith Cooper published twenty-seven tragedies, mostly verse dramas on historical or classical subjects. Only one of their plays was staged, and it received poor reviews. Their unique literary collaboration also produced eight collections of poetry, one of which pays tribute to Sappho . Selections from their journal and letters appeared posthumously. Their Greek paganism influenced their earliest works, while their conversion to Roman Catholicism left its mark on later ones. Although MF 's work fell out of favour with most readers and critics early in her career, this collaborative oeuvre has enjoyed a recent renaissance.
  • BirthNames: Catherine Harris Bradley
    Bradley was christened Catherine, but she altered the spelling.
    Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
    ; Edith Emma Cooper
  • Nicknames: Michael; Henry
  • Self-constructed: Katharine; Michael Field
  • Pseudonyms: Arran Leigh
    Arran is an island off the Scottish coast, located in the Firth of Clyde. It may be relevant that Katharine's mother, Edith's grandmother, was born with the surname Harris, and that Harris is also the name of an island (or, strictly, half an island, the other half being Lewis) in the Outer Hebrides.
    ; Isla Leigh
    Isla or Islay is an island in the Inner Hebrides.

Photo of Michael Field (that is, of Katherine Harris Bradley, left, and Edith Emma Cooper. right) from the waist up, leaning toward each other. They are wearing plain black dresses.

Milestones

27 October 1846

Katharine Harris Bradley (who was later known, along with Edith Cooper , as MF ) was born at the address 10 Digbeth in Birmingham, the much younger one of two girls in her family.
The Feminist Companion misprints Katharine's birth date as 1864.
Blain, Virginia et al., editors. The Feminist Companion to Literature in English: Women Writers from the Middle Ages to the Present. Yale University Press; Batsford, 1990.
Sturgeon, Mary. Michael Field. G. G. Harrap, 1922.
14
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.

12 January 1862

Edith Cooper (who later shared the pen name MF with Katharine Harris Bradley ) was born at Kenilworth in Warwickshire, at an address in the High Street; she was the elder of two girls.
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.

By 24 July 1875

Katharine Harris Bradley (later one of the writing partnership who made up MF ) published a volume of poems, The New Minnesinger, under the pseudonym Arran Leigh.
Athenæum. J. Lection.
2491 (1875): 114
Blain, Virginia et al., editors. The Feminist Companion to Literature in English: Women Writers from the Middle Ages to the Present. Yale University Press; Batsford, 1990.

By 18 June 1889

Writing as MF , Katharine Harris Bradley and Edith Cooper published Long Ago, a collection of poems written around the surviving fragments of Sappho .
Prins, Yopie. Victorian Sappho. Princeton University Press, 1999.
93
Blain, Virginia et al., editors. The Feminist Companion to Literature in English: Women Writers from the Middle Ages to the Present. Yale University Press; Batsford, 1990.

13 December 1913

Edith Cooper (known collectively with Katharine Harris Bradley as the poet MF ) died of cancer at The Paragon, Petersham Road, Richmond, Surrey.
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
Faderman, Lillian. Surpassing the Love of Men: Romantic Friendship and Love Between Women from the Renaissance to the Present. William Morrow, 1981.
212

26 September 1914

Katharine Harris Bradley (who had shared the pen-name MF with Edith Cooper ) died of cancer at The Cottage, near Armitage in Staffordshire.
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
Faderman, Lillian. Surpassing the Love of Men: Romantic Friendship and Love Between Women from the Renaissance to the Present. William Morrow, 1981.
212
Sturgeon, Mary. Michael Field. G. G. Harrap, 1922.
61

10 November 1933

Selections from the journal of MF appeared posthumously as Works and Days (title of the best-known work by the Greek poet Hesiod ). This book offered new insight into the work and life of Katharine Harris Bradley and Edith Cooper .
Blain, Virginia et al., editors. The Feminist Companion to Literature in English: Women Writers from the Middle Ages to the Present. Yale University Press; Batsford, 1990.
TLS Centenary Archive Centenary Archive [1902-2012]. http://www.gale.com/c/the-times-literary-supplement-historical-archive.
1658 (9 November 1933): 766

Biography

Katharine's Birth and Family

27 October 1846

Katharine Harris Bradley (who was later known, along with Edith Cooper , as MF ) was born at the address 10 Digbeth in Birmingham, the much younger one of two girls in her family.
The Feminist Companion misprints Katharine's birth date as 1864.
Blain, Virginia et al., editors. The Feminist Companion to Literature in English: Women Writers from the Middle Ages to the Present. Yale University Press; Batsford, 1990.
Sturgeon, Mary. Michael Field. G. G. Harrap, 1922.
14
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.

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