Grace King wrote “The past is our only possession in life”. She was born in New Orleans in 1851. Her family had an aristocratic background but was impoverished by the American Civil War. Grace King eventually found her living in writing; among her subjects were other women who had been put in the same situation. Her first novel Monsieur Motte (1888), brought her to the attention of the Hartford Literary set including Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain). I am in her debt as she provided the link between Twain and Frederic Church the painter. Her descriptions of her visit to the Clemenses in Hartford: “Life with them followed the simplest and most practical lines. Worldly deviations and social complications were ignored…the two daughters [Susy and Clara Clemens] were the more entrancing of characters I have ever met in my life. They were both beautiful in every way;” and later her visit with them to the Church’s mansion in the Catskills in 1892: “Could anything in nature be more beautiful;” form a key part of my story. After her visit to “Orlana” as she called it, she set off to explore Europe. I also included a description of her visit to the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris in a later chapter and sneaked a reference to her visit to Warwick Castle into Death in Leamington as well! Thank you Grace King.
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