Marie Corelli

-
Standard Name: Corelli, Marie
Birth Name: Mary Mackay
Nickname: Minnie
Pseudonym: Marie Corelli
MC was one of the first authors of the modern best seller. She published thirty-one popular novels, including one, published posthumously, which fictionalizes events from her own life. She also wrote short stories (collected in four volumes). She wrote poetry as a child and published a collection of poems posthumously. Her novels have been seen as blending the conventions of the romance, gothic, historical, and society novels. At the turn of the century, sales of each of her novels were in the range of 175,000 copies; at the end of world war one her fame and sales fell drastically. She was the first woman to lecture before the Royal Society of Literature : The Signs of the Times was presented on 20 February 1902.
Black and white photo of Mary Corelli by F. Adrian, published in 1904. She sits in a chair that is adorned in unusual style with tassels, wearing a pale dress and holding an open book. Her hair is short and curly, artfully disarranged.

Connections

Connections Author name Excerpt
Intertextuality and Influence Rose Allatini
But the manuscript never reaches a publisher, for Olive gives it to her mother, aunt, and sister to read, with fearful results. To her aunt it is indecent and impossible; to her mother it is...
Textual Production Hélène Barcynska
She says she was ambitious from an early age, wanting to earn her own fast cars and other luxuries,
Barcynska, Hélène. Full and Frank: The Private Life of a Woman Novelist. Hurst and Blackett.
18
and wanting also to Make a Name.
Barcynska, Hélène. Full and Frank: The Private Life of a Woman Novelist. Hurst and Blackett.
27
Because her mother told her almost no...
Intertextuality and Influence Marjorie Bowen
Critic Maria Aline Seabra Ferreira comments that the book combines historical and supernatural elements reminiscent of Marie Corelli 'sThe Sorrows of Satan (1895) with the baroque aspects of Jacobean tragedy. The novel is also...
Textual Production Mary Elizabeth Braddon
The first instalment of MEB 's hugely popular novel Lady Audley's Secret appeared in Robin Goodfellow; when this weekly sixpenny failed thirteen weeks later, she dropped Lady Audley for Aurora Floyd.
The editor...
Literary responses Florence Dixie
FD received many letters of appreciation from individual readers: from a sailor on a British warship and a soldier with the army in South Africa, as well as from Ouida and Marie Corelli , to...
Friends, Associates Ménie Muriel Dowie
As a public literary figure MMD moved amongst the major writers of her day. At the Women Writers' Dinner of the New Vagabonds Club in June 1895, she spoke alongside Adeline Sergeant , Christabel Coleridge
Literary responses Daphne Du Maurier
Rebecca was DDM 's best known work, earning her massive profits, and it has become one of the most widely read novels of all time.
Kelly, Richard. Daphne du Maurier. Twayne.
66
The Times Literary Supplement reviewer wrote: In its kind...
Education Elaine Feinstein
Her MA followed automatically three years after her Cambridge BA. She achieved her Part I bar finals in London, but dropped the idea of practising law when she understood how much money she would...
Textual Production Elaine Feinstein
EF has carried out a great deal of scholarly commentary of a kind best calculated to be useful to readers (though she did not finish her MA thesis on nineteenth-century sexual fantasists like Ouida and...
Publishing Jessie Fothergill
The copyright of the novel initially sold for £40 on 26 March 1877. Two months later, Richard Bentley and Son recognized its commercial possibilities and drew up a new contract, increasing the price to £200...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text John Oliver Hobbes
JOH sometimes discusses her own writing, career, and ambition: One's place in literature is a possession—never a concession. And one knows one's place. I don't wish to be judged—one way or the other—till I am...
Education Naomi Jacob
One of NJ 's favourite home occupations even as a small child was improvised acting, with her sister in spear-carrying roles. She also learned cricket and football, and her grandfather Collinson taught her whist. She...
Friends, Associates Jane Francesca, Lady Wilde
In London JFLW associated with writers such as Marie Corelli , Ouida , and Violet Hunt . Oscar , an emerging celebrity, introduced his mother to the city's artistic circle.
Literary responses Sheila Kaye-Smith
Critic Rachel Anderson considers that the religous or quasi-religious element in SKS 's characters—their larger-than-life passions and obsessions, their quests and self-lacerations and rebirths—link her work with that of such romance-writers as Florence Barclay ,...
Textual Production Q. D. Leavis
In her essays, reviews, introductions, and lectures, QDL also developed varied critiques of such authors as Charlotte Brontë , George Eliot , Charlotte Yonge , Marie Corelli , Edith Wharton , Naomi Mitchison , Amabel Williams-Ellis

Timeline

1681: The baroque composer Arcangelo Corelli (1653-1713)...

Building item

1681

The baroque composer Arcangelo Corelli (1653-1713) published his first twelve Church Sonatas, dedicated to Queen Christina of Sweden (who had abdicated and was living in Rome).

2 July 1914: The first issue of the magazine Blast, edited...

Building item

2 July 1914

The first issue of the magazine Blast, edited by Wyndham Lewis , formally announced the arrival of Vorticism, an avant-garde movement in art.

1951: Theatre historian Allardyce Nicoll established...

Writing climate item

1951

Theatre historian Allardyce Nicoll established the Shakespeare Institute ; it is part of Birmingham University and is housed in Mason Croft at Stratford, formerly the home of novelist Marie Corelli .

Texts

Corelli, Marie. "Temporal Power". Methuen, 1902.
Corelli, Marie. A Romance of Two Worlds. R. Bentley, 1886.
Corelli, Marie. A Romance of Two Worlds. Hurst, 1900, http://HSS PR 4504 R7.
Corelli, Marie. Barabbas. Methuen, 1893.
Corelli, Marie. Boy. Hutchinson, 1900.
Corelli, Marie. Free Opinions. A. Constable, 1905.
Keating, Peter John, and Marie Corelli. “Introduction”. The Sorrows of Satan, Oxford University Press, 1996, p. ix - xx.
Corelli, Marie. Is All Well with England?. Jarrolds, 1917.
Corelli, Marie, and G. H. Edwards. Jane. Hutchinson, 1897.
Corelli, Marie. Love—and the Philosopher. Methuen, 1923.
Corelli, Marie. Open Confession. Hutchinson, 1924.
Corelli, Marie. Poems. Hutchinson, 1925.
Corelli, Marie, and Arthur Severn. The Devil’s Motor. Hodder and Stoughton, 1910.
Corelli, Marie. The Master-Christian. Methuen, 1900.
Corelli, Marie et al. The Modern Marriage Market. Hutchinson, 1898.
Corelli, Marie. The Silver Domino. Lamley, 1892.
Corelli, Marie. The Sorrows of Satan. Methuen, 1895.
Corelli, Marie. The Sorrows of Satan. Methuen, 1900.
Corelli, Marie. The Soul of Lilith. R. Bentley, 1892.
Corelli, Marie. The Treasure of Heaven. A. Constable, 1906.
Corelli, Marie. Thelma. R. Bentley, 1887.
Corelli, Marie. Vendetta!. R. Bentley, 1886.
Corelli, Marie. Vendetta!. Methuen, 1962.
Corelli, Marie. Wormwood. R. Bentley and Son, 1890.
Corelli, Marie. Wormwood. Methuen, 1897, http://HSS PR 4504 W92 1897.