Ursula Bethell

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Mary Ursula Bethell (born October 6, 1874 in Horsell , Surrey , England , † January 15, 1945 in Christchurch ) was a New Zealand social worker and poet who was involved in social projects for decades and who also went under the pseudonym "Evelyn Hayes" and "EH “Published numerous poems. Ursula Bethell is recognized as one of the pioneers of contemporary New Zealand poetry. Like others of her generation, she was forced to face the tension between her English roots and sympathies and her New Zealand environment. In addition, she was asked to examine the divisions between religious certainty and everyday experiences. Her endeavors to develop a poetic voice to express her expanded understanding have been bold and innovative. In all of her observations she looked with different eyes.

Life

Origin, school education and start of social work

Mary Ursula Bethell was the eldest of three children of Barrister Richard Bethell and his wife Isabell Anne Lillie, who had both lived in New Zealand in the 1860s and who returned shortly after the birth of their first child after a brief stay in Tasmania . First they settled in Nelson and then in 1878 in Christchurch before the family moved to Rangiora in 1881 . There she grew up with her brother Marmaduke Bethell and her younger sister Rhoda and began her formal education through a governess . After the death of her father from pneumonia , the mother and her three children returned to Christchurch, where Ursula Bethell initially attended Mrs. Crosby's Girls School in Park Terrace and then the Christchurch Girls' High School .

In 1889, accompanied by Sibylla Emily Maude , she traveled to England and attended the Oxford High School for Girls there , before going to boarding school near Nyon in Switzerland from mid-1891 to mid-1892 . During this time she wrote her first poems and returned to Christchurch in late 1892. Instead of living a life supported by private support, she got involved in Sunday schools and in social work for boys from the working class because of her sense of justice and a deep Anglo-Catholic faith . There she also helped in the creation of a by Gordon Hall named home for boys and later became a founding member of the Boys' Gordon Hall - Foundation .

Traveling abroad, being seriously ill, and meeting Effie Pollen

At the end of 1895, Ursula Bethell went to England with her brother and a friend, where they visited various parts of the country such as Rise Hall , the country estate of a paternal uncle in Yorkshire . After two more years of music and painting in Germany and Switzerland, she began working as a social worker at the Lady Margaret Hall facilities at the University of Oxford in Lambeth . In 1899 she joined the Anglican community work organization Women Workers for God , the so-called "Gray Ladies", in South London. At the same time she helped Mary Lily Walker and her Dundee Social Union in Dundee , Scotland and made several trips abroad.

In December 1901 she suffered life-threatening pneumonia herself, which forced her to stop working for the Gray Ladies . She left England in 1902 and spent several months relaxing in the mountains near Santa Cruz in California before returning to New Zealand in March 1903. In 1904, after another stopover in the USA , she returned to England, where she resumed her social work at the Central Society of the Church of England for the shelter of the homeless. At the same time, she regularly visited friends and relatives in Scotland, France , Italy and Switzerland. In October 1905 she opened a home for mothers and sisters in Hampstead after abandoning her plan to use the home as a refuge for Christian social workers. She ran this house for three years with Effie Pollen, who was also from New Zealand.

Social work in St Albans and World War I in Europe

After Effie Pollen returned to New Zealand in October 1908 to look after her sick father, Ursula Bethell followed her and in March 1910 bought a house in St Albans , a suburb of Christchurch, which she named Villa Jobiska . She began working in the St Mary’s Ward in Merivale and became vice president of the newly formed Young Men's Guild . At the same time, she acted as the secretary of the local mission group and provided shelter for a sister of the Fellowship of the Sacred Name who worked as the vicar's helper .

At the end of 1913 Ursula Bethell returned to England via Java and India and was in Switzerland when the First World War broke out in the summer of 1914 . Fortunately, she was able to reach England on one of the last trains, where she subsequently worked in London as a carer in a youth home, as a helper in a Montessori school , as a night waitress in a club for New Zealand soldiers and as an assistant in an information office for soldiers. Towards the end of the war, she also helped found a school for childcare.

After the end of the war, she returned to Christchurch in 1918 and founded a home with Effie Pollen in August 1924 in Rise Cottage , a newly built bungalow in the Cashmere Hills with a view of the New Zealand Alps , the Kaikoura Ranges and the Canterbury Plains . In 1926 she made a short, final trip to England.

Beginning of poetry and mentor

At the end of 1928, Ursula Bethell not only laid out a garden on the property, but also wrote many of the poems that made her famous and which were published by Sidgwick & Jackson in 1929 under the title From a Garden in the Antipodes .

She often included poems in letters to friends and published some poems in the Australian magazine The Home under the pseudonym "Evelyn Hayes". Under this pseudonym, she published her first volume of poetry, From a Garden in the Antipodes , which was published in 1929 by the London publisher Sedgwick and Jackson . The poems described the garden, its inhabitants and their activities, and were enriched by Bethell's education, experiences and meditative religious beliefs. They also traced many of the pictures of the Canterbury countryside that she explored in her big black Essex automobile while picnicking and outing with Effie Pollen .

The collection was recognized by literary criticism in England and, ultimately, by JHE Schroder in the daily Christchurch Press . She became friends with Schroder and, through his encouragement, wrote poetry for the Christchurch Press and the North Canterbury Gazette under the pseudonym "EH". Through Schroder she also came into contact with other writers, scholars and artists such as Walter D'Arcy Cresswell , Eric Hall McCormick , Monte Holcroft , Rodney Eric Kennedy , Toss Woollaston and Basil Dowling . She became a mentor to these younger people in the 1930s and 1940s, encouraging them to write and giving advice, sometimes unwelcome. All of them were impressed by the breadth of their knowledge and literacy as well as their sophisticated taste.

Effie Pollen dies and deaconess education is promoted

When Effie Pollen suddenly died on November 8, 1934, around a month after Ursula Bethell's 60th birthday, it was a painful loss. Letters to her friends tell of the emotional pain and crisis of their faith. After this time she wrote only a few poems, including six memorial poems, which she dedicated to her friend of thirty years. In 1936, Caxton Press published another collection of her poems, Time and Place , which she also dedicated in memory of Effie Pollen.

A strong supporter of women's entry into ministry, Ursula Bethell began handing the St Albans home to the Church of England in 1935 as accommodation for St Faith's House of Sacred Learning , a deaconess training facility . At the same time, at the invitation of the chief deaconess, she moved into an apartment in this house that year and continued to support her young friends. In addition, she continued to travel before she was often in the hospital after the discovery of cancer in her zygomatic bone . 1939 by Caxton Press with Day and Night: Poems 1924-1934 published another collection of poems.

Last months of life, dealing with death and literary impact

After St Faith's House of Sacred Learning was closed in late 1943, the house was rented to Reverend Merlin Davies and his wife, with whom Ursula Bethell spent the last months of her life. During this time she began organizing her writings and writing farewell letters in preparation for her death. The fact that she met her death with clarity is indicated by her ability to change, underpinned by poems such as “Pause”.

In a very short time it can be
When our impulsive limbs and our superior skull
To give back several ounces of manure to the earth
Will the mother of everything take charge again,
And soon wipe with their elements
Our tender little human enclosures.
In a very little while, it may be,
When our impulsive limbs and our superior skulls
Have to the soil restored several ounces of fertilizer,
The mother of all will take charge again,
And soon wipe away with her elements
Our small fund human enclosures.

In 1944 there was a proposal to publish a complete edition of all of her poems in one volume. However, she died on January 15, 1945 in Christchurch before the publication. After her death she was in the Rangiora cemetery .

Ursula Bethell is recognized as one of the pioneers of contemporary New Zealand poetry. Like others of her generation, she was forced to face the tension between her English roots and sympathies and her New Zealand environment. In addition, she was asked to examine the divisions between religious certainty and everyday experiences. Her endeavors to develop a poetic voice to express her expanded understanding have been bold and innovative. In all of her observations she looked with different eyes.

According to her was literary prize Ursula Bethell Residency in Creative Writing designated. Poets such as Eleanor Catton , Catherine Chidgey , Helen Lowe , Barry Mitcalfe , Carl Nixon , John Pule and Victor Rodger have taken advantage of this support for creative writing . Her poems are still appearing today, just like at “Time”, on the Tuesday Poem blog on August 24, 2010.

Publications

  • From a Garden in the Antipodes. 1929.
  • Time and place. 1936.
  • Day and Night. 1939.
posthumously
  • Collected poems. 1950.

Background literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ "Time" in the blog Tuesday Poem
personal data
SURNAME Bethell, Ursula
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Bethell, Mary Ursula (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION New Zealand poet and social worker
DATE OF BIRTH October 6, 1874
PLACE OF BIRTH Horsell , Surrey , England
DATE OF DEATH January 15, 1945
Place of death Christchurch