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Loading... Zoffany's daughter : love and treachery on a small islandby Stephen Foster
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'I am only obeying the law that Nature has engraved indelibly in the heart of a mother, to never be separated from her child.' In July 1825 Cecilia Zoffany, daughter of a famous artist, flees to the island of Guernsey with her two young daughters, one of them disguised as a boy. Alone and distressed, the beautiful stranger seeks the help of locals in a desperate attempt to retain the custody of her children. Her estranged husband, a London clergyman, follows close behind. Time is running out for Cecilia and everyone is watching. A mother's love stands defiantly against the absolute rights of a father. The Royal Court of Guernsey is called upon to adjudicate. The press, local gossips and her apparent new friends all have their say. Whom can Cecilia trust? And, given the evidence, why should we trust her? Meanwhile, Cecilia's elder daughter confides in her diary ... This is a true story about child custody, patriarchy, love and treachery - with reflections on the relationship between history and fiction. No library descriptions found. |
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 Google Books — Loading...GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)920History & geography Biography & genealogy Biography, genealogy, insigniaRatingAverage: (3)
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Wikipedia in English
1
German-born Johan Zoffany (1733-1810) was a distinguished neoclassical painter whose works are held in the National Gallery and the Tate, and the Royals have some too because his patron in England was George III (the mad one). But Zoffany was dead by the time events in this history take place and no help to his daughter Cecilia, except to confer upon her the status of a lady. And had he been alive, he may not have wished to be involved in her travails, because then as now, custody battles are unedifying affairs. The best thing we can say about the 21st century version of such battles is that at least they take place without the attention of scandal-mongering newspapers.
Which was not the case in the 19th century. Newspapers, in fact, turn out to be a major source of information for historian Stephen Foster when he set out to unravel the story of Cecilia Zoffany, the estranged wife of the clergyman Thomas Horne, who turned up on the island of Guernsey with two of her eight children, Clementina and Laura, and promptly provoked a storm of scandal and gossip. But the book is not a straightforward chronological narrative of events: it consists of introductory material on the nature and credibility of sources; background information about the history of child custody and the legal status of women; Clementina’s imagined journal; and excerpts from newspapers and court documents from St Peter Port in Guernsey. An extensive list of sources at the back of the book shows the extent of the research, nicely balanced by the author’s warning at the outset:
Zoffany’s Daughter is subtitled ‘Love and treachery on a small island’, but it seems to me that in the battle for custody of the girls, the treachery is not clear-cut.
To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2017/12/24/zoffanys-daughter-by-stephen-foster/ (