Mrs Delaney (1700-88) is an inspiring example for old age; also a reproach to those who think ‘upper class’ a term of abuse and that women have only recently had a life.
Mrs Delaney (1700-88) is an inspiring example for old age; also a reproach to those who think ‘upper class’ a term of abuse and that women have only recently had a life.
Her extraordinary cut-paper flowers, collected in the 10-volume Flora Delanica, are now enshrined in the British Museum as masterpieces of collage art. Looking at their remarkable intricacy and accuracy, it is incredible to think she made them between the age of 72 and 82. Nonetheless, these ‘floral mosaiks’, as she called them, are only the summation of her achievements.
Social, intellectual, private and public life in the 18th century met, for the women and men of Mrs Delaney’s circle, in floriculture, which intersected with science, fashion, collecting and the decorative arts. Mrs Delaney left a formidable body of work other than the Flora Delanica — landscaped gardens, oil paintings, drawings (topographical and anthropological), plasterwork, shellwork, featherwork, needlework, textile design, japanning, as well as an unpublished novella (included here) and, through her letters, an historically important commentary on life and society in Georgian England and Ireland. As a confidante of George III and Queen Charlotte, she brought royal favour to Fanny Burney and the portraitists John Opie and Thomas Lawrence.
Mary Granville was the niece of the Jacobite Lord Lansdowne. She was brought up in Whitehall by an aunt and uncle. When Handel visited, the only available instrument for him to play on was her child’s spinet. Afterwards, her uncle asked if she would ever play as well. ‘If I did not think I should I would burn my instrument!’ she replied.
A disastrous arranged marriage left her widowed at 21 and dependent on friends, most advantageously the second Duchess of Portland, a famous collector, whose seat at Bulstrode, Buckinghamshire, became ‘an incubator’ of Linnaean botany in England. She circulated in the beau monde, settling in Ireland after she married Swift’s close friend, Dr Delaney, in 1743. With Swift the Delaneys introduced the Picturesque garden to the Irish Ascendancy. On her husband’s death in 1768 she returned to England, where she became semi-resident at Bulstrode until the Duchess’s death in 1785.
It was one day at Bulstrode that she re-ignited her childhood passion for paper-cutting. The Duchess entered the room and, mistaking false petals for real, exclaimed: ‘What are you doing with the geranium!’ She then greatly encouraged her friend to pursue her talent and is the dedicatee of Flora Delanica.
Yale books have class, so Mrs Delaney, ‘the woman of fashion of all ages’ in Burke’s phrase, would surely applaud this elegant commemoration. It brings Delaney studies to a new pitch of scholarly refinement, with a dozen experts exploring the various aspects of her achievement in sometimes clinical detail. It accompanies an exhibition at the Yale Centre for British Art (till 3 January) and Sir John Soane’s Museum (18 February-10 May).