The Lost Diaries of Susanna Moodie

by Cecily Ross

  “Really? You can’t imagine how—”

  “Then we shall meet again soon and you will bring a few of your poems with you.” She took my hands in hers and squeezed them warmly. “There are so few women at these affairs; I am in need of a like-minded friend if I am to return to society.”

  And with that, we rose and rejoined the party.

  FEBRUARY 15, 1831

  Mrs. Shelley has invited me for tea tomorrow at four!

  I have learned from Papa Pringle that the usually reclusive authoress has been making appearances at literary salons of late to bring attention to the publication of a new edition of Frankenstein. He said that, as far as he knows, she lives in north London and seldom ventures into society, preferring to live quietly with her son—the only one of her four children to survive infancy. I am ashamed to admit that I have not read any of her other novels, none of which captured the public’s imagination as thoroughly as her first. (To think she was a girl of eighteen when she wrote it!) For the most part, she devotes herself to promoting her late husband’s writing, and it is said she is putting together a “collected works” for publication. Interest in the life and poetry of Percy Shelley has assumed cult-like proportions in London, and according to Papa P., Mrs. Shelley is under pressure from her publishers to advance her own interests and those of her late husband by being more visible in literary circles.

  I am beyond excited at the prospect of seeing her again tomorrow. How fortuitous that as I commit myself to a career in letters, I should meet someone whose example stands as a shining star, lighting the way to the realization of my own ambitions. When I consider her poise and self-assurance, her tragic dignity as she basks in the admiration of her peers, I am filled with an emotion that is akin to awe.

  Enough. Inspiring as they are, such thoughts are only keeping me from my work. Lately, I spend long hours, pen in hand, attempting to unstop my sluggish imagination and write something that does not end up in the wastebasket no sooner than it is on the page. Perhaps it is the dampness. I long to throw a few extra coals on the fire, an unwise extravagance given my current circumstances. If I cannot generate an amusing sketch as promised for The Athenaeum, I am doomed to freeze to death.

  FEBRUARY 16, 1831

  I have left three of my Enthusiasm poems with Mrs. Shelley. I feel they are my best work, even if the emotion that gave birth to them is somewhat diminished. She received them without comment and placed them on the desk she was sitting at, evidently hard at work, when the maid let me in. Her small house, a cottage really, is exceedingly modest though decorated with surprising exuberance given the owner’s understated presence.

  There were books everywhere, of course, but also mementoes from the years she and her husband spent in Paris and Venice and Geneva: paintings of soaring alps under impossibly blue skies, of narrow city streets shining in the rain; carpets woven in the Orient and carried by camel and riverboat to Swiss merchants; a length of fuchsia silk framing a deep-set window; a bowl of lemons (brought to her by her old friend Leigh Hunt, just returned from Greece). But most touching of all was the small portrait of her angelic son William, who was only a year old when he was taken by malaria in 1819.

  “We called him little Willmouse,” she said, taking down the painting from the wall beside her and passing it to me. (I don’t know if I will ever have children of my own, but the loss of a babe such as this would finish me completely.)

  Despite the colourful accoutrements, my general impression of Mrs. Shelley’s parlour was one of genteel poverty, with which I am only too familiar. The upholstery was threadbare, the wood floors worn, and the unmistakable odour of mould and mouse droppings hung in the air. How chilling to think the widow of one of the most successful poets of his generation (and herself a noted author) should be forced to live in such a poor state. It was enough to make my own lofty ambitions sag a little.

  While we waited for tea, she talked quietly about the weather and her hopes for her son Percy, who goes away to school next fall. I must have been shivering; I had given the maid my coat when I arrived, and my best dress was no match for the draught coming in through the front window. Mrs. Shelley noticed my discomfort immediately.

  “Here,” she insisted, “take my shawl. I have a cupboard full of them.” She stood and placed it, a garment of the finest merino wool in a soft shade of lavender, upon my shoulders. “Now, Miss Strickland,” she said as she pulled a dark blue scarf from the back of the settee and drew it tightly to her, “I must hear all about your life. You are new to London, I think? And how do you find it here? It is very brave of you to strike out on your own. I have found out myself how hostile the world can be to unmarried women such as ourselves. But then, marriage is not for everyone . . .” She widened her eyes and hesitated as though waiting for me to finish her thought, which I did, not wanting her to think that my spinsterhood was an unavoidable condition.

  “Indeed it is not,” I proclaimed. “As a matter of fact, in the interests of pursuing my writing, I have recently broken off an engagement that was dear to my heart.”

  “Really? You would rather endure poverty alone than in the company of a good husband?” Her laugh as she said this was small and hard. Then she shrugged and smiled lightly. “I assume your former intended had little to offer in the way of property or security.”

  “As much as a half-pensioned soldier can offer,” I said. “It is less than the small amount I manage to wring from my writing.” Though I hardly knew her, I found myself wanting to unburden myself to this woman, who had borne so much in her life. I wanted her to affirm the decision that I am beginning to realize weighs heavily on my heart. “He would have us live on his farm in southern Africa,” I continued as Mrs. Shelley poured the tea. “But it is a prospect that truly I cannot bear to contemplate.”

  “Miss . . . Susanna—may I call you that? And you must call me Mary.” She settled back in her chair and stirred her tea slowly, gazing into its porcelain depths as though they held the secret to all the vagaries of the heart. “After the loss of my sweet babes, my heart grew so insensible that I thought nothing would ever penetrate the carapace of suffering that encased it. And indeed, the news of my dear Percy’s sudden death was like one more wave pounding a rocky shore. I could not absorb it. I was immune to pain, beyond suffering, alive and sensible in fact but not in essence. At the time, I did not have the stores of emotion necessary to mourn his loss. The years passed and the ghosts of my children continued to linger, as they still do, spectral memories, my constant companions, while my absent husband’s spirit hung in limbo, a non-existence to which I had banished him.”

  She paused to sip her tea. “You know,” she said, a smile touching her lips, “Percy would recoil at what I have become—the keeper of his flame, the faithful wife even in death, the loyal servant of his memory and his art. He believed in free love. We all did. I was brought up in a household where monogamy and conventional marriage were seen as a form of slavery. And we lived by those covenants.” She paused. “You know of my parents’ work, I assume?”

  I assured her immediately of my reverence for A Vindication of the Rights of Woman and of my familiarity with Mr. Godwin’s ideas, although I said nothing of my thoughts on the notion of anarchism as a moral good. Mrs. Shelley nodded and continued.

  “There were other women for Percy, many of them, and for me” —she hesitated—“lovers, yes . . . and close friendships. But I did not know then what I came to realize in the years after his death: that Percy was my only husband, my true love, not just in the eyes of society but according to whatever divine law exists.”

  Then she did the most remarkable thing. Bending to open a lower drawer in her desk, she took out a small grey silk bag and loosened the drawstring that kept it closed. Shaking it lightly, she released its contents onto the palm of her hand. I leaned forward to behold what looked like a dried and shrivelled piece of leather about the size of a large walnut. I raised my inquiring eyes to hers.

  “Percy’s
heart,” she said, cradling the dreadful item in both hands now.

  I tried to recover myself. “Oh, I see.” I sat back in my chair.

  “I keep it as a reminder that the body is nothing.” She looked down at the very, very prosaic item she was holding. “Nothing more than this. It is the soul that prevails. The soul, the poetry—these are where the heart truly lies. His spirit is with me always and will live on. But this”—she slipped the desiccated souvenir back into the bag and put it away—“this is merely matter. Ugly and temporal. Nothing.”

  She appraised me with narrowed eyes. “You are shocked,” she observed. And I admit I was. Of course, I had known of the radical individualism practised by Percy Shelley and Lord Byron and others, but hearing such an admission on the lips of someone as outwardly respectable as Mary Shelley was another matter altogether. A self-confessed adulterer, other men, and women too? Her husband’s heart in a drawer, and now my newest friend?

  “Oh no, it is not my place to judge . . .” I could feel the colour rushing to my cheeks.

  “Of course it is, a country girl from a good Anglican family. But never mind. I have given all that up. Our experiments caused us nothing but pain.” She straightened her shoulders and threw out her tiny chin. “I have come to believe that a woman’s greatest gift to society is her role in the family. Without the compassion and affections that are natural to the gentler sex, there is little hope for the world. I believe it is a woman’s duty to nurture those values within the context of marriage, and by doing so, triumph over the violent and destructive tendencies of men. Only then will they be free to express the sympathy and generosity of their better natures.”

  A provocative afternoon. But my new mentor’s conflicting messages baffle me still. How can she be so unconventional in some ways and so conservative in others? I am beginning to see it is possible to hold two contradictory passions in your heart at once.

  FEBRUARY 18, 1831

  Papa Pringle is now cautioning me against associating too closely with Mrs. Shelley (or “the notorious Mary Shelley” as he referred to her on our walk this morning). And this after the previous week’s admonition that I seek out the society of other writers as a way of honing my craft and, above all, making connections in the literary world.

  “Mrs. Shelley has indeed achieved a degree of success in publishing seldom granted to the gentler sex,” he said as we made our way along Islington High Street, “but it is due less to talent than to her association with her poet husband.” Here, he lowered his voice in consideration, I suppose, of the delicate morals of the ragged boys begging outside the Angel Coach House as we passed by. Papa tossed one of them a sixpence and walked on. “Shelley’s reputation as an adulterer and insolvent, I daresay, outstrips his artistic renown.”

  At this, I felt a shimmer of irritation. “Surely, Papa, you will not deny that Percy Bysshe Shelley is one of the great poets of our age?”

  “Of course not, my dear. But the mantle of greatness carries with it a responsibility to conduct oneself in a manner befitting a public personage.” It was a brisk, bright morning, and the round, red tip of Papa’s generous nose glistened as with drops of dew. “And then there is the notoriety of Mrs. Shelley’s parents.”

  “But have you read Frankenstein?” I protested. “Did you not think it a work of disturbing and uncanny prescience?”

  He flipped his fingers in the air as though brushing away a fly. “Oh yes, years ago. A horror story. A tale for children. Not to be taken seriously. Now promise me, my dear, that you will let the acquaintance drop. It will do you no good in the long run. You have a great deal of work to do, and while I sympathize with much of the reformist fever sweeping England these days, one must still choose one’s acquaintances with care. There is an overzealousness in the air.”

  Just then, as though to lend weight to Papa Pringle’s measured opining, a strange figure in a long black cloak and red tricorn galloped past us on a milk-white horse. In his wake, a procession of blacking boys in scarlet cockades, carrying long poles wound with red streamers, surged through the streets, crying, “Hunt forever,” and “Radical reform,” until our ears would gladly have shut themselves against their teeth-jarring chants. We learned from fellow bystanders it was the radical farmer MP Henry Hunt arriving in London to take his seat in Parliament. Judging by the spectacle we witnessed, Hunt will add more than a little liveliness to the business of government.

  “An unprincipled demagogue,” sniffed Papa as Hunt and his motley parade passed before us. We watched them gather and mill about at the tollgate, unable to muster the money to pay. It was, I must say, more circus than serious protest. I was surprised, however, at Papa’s distaste for the spectacle, as I believe he shares Mr. Hunt’s opinions on the matter of universal suffrage and the need for parliamentary reform.

  “I thought you were in favour of his ideas,” I said, “his views on the excesses of power and wealth that perpetuate slavery and other ills.” My confusion was genuine.

  “Susanna, my dear, reform is always desirable, but it must come from within. Change can be effected only by men of education and moderation. Otherwise, the rabble rules, and misery and bloodshed are the only outcomes. Look at France. Look at what that nation’s capitulation to passion over prudence has led to. Your new friend Mary Shelley is not a reformer; she is a radical, her zeal no doubt tempered by age and misfortune, but a radical nevertheless.”

  Anger flared inside me like a scarlet banner. I halted and turned to face him right there in the street.

  “You have counselled me against marriage and convention, and now you are warning me of the dangers of living outside those conventions. Forgive me if I do not see another way. Are you telling me all my choices are bad ones?”

  He placed a consoling arm about my shoulders. His manner was gentle, patient, as though reasoning with a child. “Shhh. Of course not, my dear. There will be other paths. Be patient and you will find them.”

  I stepped away from his embrace and faced him again. “I think you are being hypocritical. Mrs. Shelley has offered to help me. She is a friend when I badly need one. Would you deny me this?” I didn’t wait for his answer but hurried home on my own so that he would not see my tears. Other paths? For the life of me, I cannot fathom what they might be.

  FEBRUARY 20, 1831

  Is it not a strange coincidence that Mary Shelley’s dear husband died these many years ago in a sailing accident? And that my own misplaced Moodie also risks his life for the dubious thrill of exploring the savage seas of his native land? Since my conversation with Mrs. . . . with Mary, I have given more thought to the nature of a woman’s obligations to society. Surely, my mentor’s conviction that keeping watch over the temple of the heart should be the female vocation is the very idea I am trying to outrun. What of my writing? If Mary Shelley has put her husband’s memory before her own ambitions, who am I to aspire to such independence? But how can I be mistress of my own destiny when I am a servant to others?

  And yet sometimes I fear I have as much hope of succeeding in the world of men as does a grub in a chicken coop. My heart is torn like a sail in a tempest. Moodie is very much on my mind.

  Mr. Harral has accepted “The Vanquished Lion” but passed on my long poem “Arminius.” Two weeks in the making and nothing to show for it.

  MARCH 1, 1831

  Moodie has returned, though we have not met. I dread our reunion and yet can think of nothing else. Kate informs me he is lingering in Bungay for a day or two and then plans to come up to London. She saw him briefly just yesterday and reports his heart is broken by my rejection.

  “I never thought I would ever see the most cheerful man on earth in such a state,” was her rather cruel (to me at least) assessment of my former betrothed’s condition. I must harden my resolve.

  Despite Papa’s cautions, or perhaps in reaction to them, I have invited Mary to dine with me here at my rooms tomorrow. I hope she will not mind the modesty of my circumstances. The more I come to know
her, the more I am attracted to her quiet resilience and the glimmer of a spirit undiminished by the accumulating years. They say that when a woman loses her youth, she becomes invisible, but Mary Shelley is living proof of the durable beauty bestowed by the intelligence and forbearance of the “weaker” sex. I know of no man her equal.

  I have ordered a pork pie (two shillings, six pence—a rare extravagance!). And I shall open the claret, a gift from Mr. Harral last fall. Do I dare ask about my poems? My heart recoils at the possibility of discouragement.

  MARCH 3, 1831

  What a fool I have been. How naive of me to think a woman of Mrs. Shelley’s worldliness would seek out someone of my limited accomplishment for intellectual kinship alone! I fear that all along her purpose has been to lure me into an intimacy whose true nature I dare not reveal here . . . though where else should I unburden myself? I do fear her purpose in regards to me is Sapphic in nature. Oh, dear Papa, I should have listened instead of almost letting myself be drawn into what surely might have been a mire of immorality such as I can scarcely imagine. As soon as she left yesterday in a whorl of black lace, I threw myself on my knees and begged our dear Lord to forgive my weakness and to give me strength to calm my spirit, which I fear is sorely shaken.

  It began with such benign intimations: a mild late winter’s night, the air as still as lake water. The blue-grey sequined sky outside my windows seemed to promise a rare intimacy, an encounter of mythic proportions. And in truth, I was breathless with anticipation of my guest’s arrival. Yes, I admit it. I have been infatuated by her gentle demeanour, her air of lingering sadness, her attentiveness to my struggles. How privileged I felt to be able to bask in another’s understanding of what it means to love and lose, to stand alone as a writer and a woman in a world of men. But not this! No, surely not. I am overcome by feelings I cannot name or even acknowledge.