Laurence Hope

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Standard Name: Hope, Laurence
Birth Name: Adela Florence Cory
Married Name: Adela Florence Nicolson
Nickname: Violet
Pseudonym: Laurence Hope
LH , a writer of exotic, Orientalist love lyrics, published three volumes of immensely successful poetry in the early twentieth century. They remained popular for a number of years after her death. Favourites among her lyrics, like Kashmiri Song and Less than the Dust Beneath Thy Chariot Wheels, had their lives prolonged in musical settings which were sung both in drawing-rooms and in the repertoire of famous singers.
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
Response to her as a poet, however, has often been overshadowed by romanticized readings of her biography.
Black and white photograph of Laurence Hope, with her elbows propped up, her hands folded on top of each other, and her head leaning on her hands. She is wearing thick metal bracelets on both of her wrists, and she has short dark hair.

Connections

Connections Author name Excerpt
death Anna Wickham
Although AW 's suicide came with little warning, she showed, in an unfinished autobiography written more than ten years earlier, a portentous awareness of a tradition of suicide among women poets: There have been few...
Family and Intimate relationships Victoria Cross
Both of VC 's sisters were involved in literary activities. The elder, Isabel Edith Cory , was born and died in India. Isabel assisted their father with the Sind Gazette and edited it for eight...
Friends, Associates Flora Annie Steel
One of these warmly admired men was Malcolm Nicolson of the Indian Army , who later married Adela Florence Cory . FAS 's biographer suggests that she was not fond of this woman (known after...
Friends, Associates Victoria Cross
Possibly because VC spent so much time travelling, it is difficult to judge the extent of her social circle. She is unmentioned by many literary autobiographies of the period. Charlotte Mitchell suggests that she may...
Occupation Rudyard Kipling
He worked for five years in Lahore (then in India, now in Pakistan) as assistant editor at the Civil and Military Gazette (to which both his parents contributed and whose editor was Arthur Cory
Textual Production Mary Agnes Hamilton
Mary Agnes Hamilton , aged about thirty, published her first book, a novel entitled Less than the Dust. Its title comes from a poem of erotic self-abnegation by Laurence Hope (whose real name was Adela Cory).
Solo: Search Oxford University Libraries Online. 18 July 2011, http://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/primo_library/libweb/action/search.do?vid=OXVU1&fromLogin=true&reset_config=true.
Wealth and Poverty Victoria Cross
Having inherited her uncle's wealth, VC left an estate valued at £87,304 10s 8d, with farm property in Northamptonshire and Shropshire. Her will became the subject of a protracted legal dispute: she had left...

Timeline

1911: Flemington, a historical novel by Scottish...

Women writers item

1911

Flemington, a historical novel by Scottish poet and fiction-writer Violet Jacob (1863-1946), drew a long letter of praise from John Buchan .
Tweedsmuir, Susan. The Lilac and the Rose. G. Duckworth, 1952.
54-6

Texts

Hope, Laurence, and Byam Shaw. Complete Love Lyrics. De Luxe Edition, Garden City, 1942.
Hope, Laurence. India’s Love Lyrics. John Lane, 1912.
Hope, Laurence. Indian Love. Heinemann, 1905.
Hope, Laurence. Indian Love. William Heinemann, 1930.
Hope, Laurence. Stars of the Desert. Heinemann, 1903.
Hope, Laurence. The Garden of Káma. Heinemann, 1901.