Mary anne disraeli biography of william

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Mary anne disraeli biography of william: Mary Anne Disraeli, 1st Viscountess

In November she felt well enough to hold a small dinner party for their close friends; but her condition deteriorated and she died on 15 December, at the age of eighty. She was the most cheerful and courageous woman I ever knew" her husband wrote after her death. His great adversary William Ewart Gladstonewho had liked Mary, wrote him a letter of condolence.

Disraeli, touched by this sympathy from a man who disliked him, replied that "Marriage is the greatest earthly happiness when founded on mutual sympathy. The house is now in the care of the National Trustand has been preserved in the state when it was occupied by the Disraelis. It is open to the public as a visitor attraction. Download as PDF Printable version.

In other projects. Wikimedia Commons Wikidata item. Wife of British Prime Minister. The Right Honourable. Wyndham Lewis. Benjamin Disraeli. Biography [ edit ]. Cultural depictions [ edit ]. Arms [ edit ].

Mary anne disraeli biography of william: Mary Anne Evans, 12 years Disraeli's

References [ edit ]. The London Gazette. She was 39 and had married well, if not happily: her spouse was a businessman turned member of Parliament. Disraeli was 27 and had already tried his hand at lawyering, stock-market speculating, and the newspaper business before publishing a novel scrutinizing London society, which reviewers hated.

He cultivated self-consciously Byronic passions, styling his hair in black ringlets, donning purple trousers with scarlet waistcoats, and wearing his rings on top of white gloves.

Mary anne disraeli biography of william: This old book reflects a deep,

He had accumulated a mountain of debt. Less than four decades later, Benjamin Disraeli was the prime minister of Britain. He orchestrated a massive expansion of the franchise that nearly doubled the number of Britons eligible to vote, and he embarked upon a legendary feud with that other presiding genius of British politics, the Liberal William Gladstone.

Disraeli also wheedled his way into the affections of Queen Victoria, who as a personal favor to the prime minister granted Mary Anne the title of viscountess in her own right.

Mary anne disraeli biography of william: Mary Anne was a

Most biographers of Disraeli have tended to treat Mary Anne at best as a bit of a joke, and at worst as an impediment to his advancement. Certainly, Mary Anne was a rich widow, her first husband dead little more than a year when she and Disraeli wed in August of And her vivacious campaigning on his behalf in Shrewsbury, where he stood for Parliament, helped him secure a seat.

She gaily chatted up the townspeople, and threw flowers into the crowd as her husband proceeded through the streets. He had to rely on other rich widows, especially the octogenarian Sarah Brydges Willyams like him a convert of Jewish originsand a friend, the financier Lionel de Rothschild, to bail him out once and for all. Disraeli used his personal story, framed by his grand passion for Mary Anne, as a political tool—mandatory in our day, but an innovation in his.

His position was in many ways preposterous: a converted Jew defending the sanctity of the Church of England, a dandy on the make leading a party of country gentlemen. He stood accused not unjustly of opportunism, even treachery. To these charges, his devotion to Mary Anne served as a counterweight, a means of rehabilitating himself.