Florence Beatrice Farr 1860 – 1917
(married name Emery, performing names Mary Lester, Florence Farr & Florence Emery, published sometimes as S.S.D.D.)
Author, actor and mystic.
7 July 1860 – 29 April 1917
Education
1873-1876 Cheltenham Ladies’ College.
1877-1880 Queen’s College, Harley Street.
Some Key Achievements and Interests
1882 Studied with actor-manager J L Toole and began an acting career.
1890 Entered the Golden Dawn, belonged to the Hermetic Order of Isis-Urania Temple of the Golden Dawn, becoming chief adept in 1897. Resigned in 1902 due to disagreements with the order joining the Theosophical Society.
1891 Acted in the first staging in England of Ibsen’s Rosmersholm.
1894 Produced a season of modern plays at the Avenue Theatre, London with the financial backing of Annie Horniman.
1899 Acted in Yeats’ The Countess Cathleen.
1898 Became stage manager for the new Irish Literary Theatre.
Involved in the performance and musical composition of plays at the Lyceum and Court Theatre and New Century Theatres in London.
19.. With Olivia Shakespear wrote The Beloved of Hathor and The Shrine of the Golden Hawk.
1904 Wrote The Mystery of Time; A Masque published in Theosophical Review, produced in 1905 at the Albert Hall Theatre.
1905 Produced Oscal Wilde’s Salomé for the first time in England.
Became an inspiration and support for W B Yeats and later G B Shaw both of whom wrote roles and plays for her.
Composed music for Yeats’ plays.
1907 Lectured in America on her and Yeats’ theory of the music in words. She assigned musical notations for the speaking voice.
Wrote on the theatre and on social and feminist issues for different publications but also on the occult for Occult Review, the Theosophical Review and New Age Journal.
1909 Published The Music of Speech.
1910 Published Modern Woman: Her Intentions
1912 Became Lady Principal of the new Ramanatha College for Girls in Ceylon.
Issues
Adopted the stage name Mary Lester as her father did not wish the family name associated with the theatre.
After four years of marriage her husband left her. She was granted a divorce on the grounds of desertion and adultery but was not unhappy about the separation. Her husband had not supported her to develop her career.
She worked to support herself but was continually under financial pressure.
Farr has received attention for her relationships with contemporary men at the expense of her own writing. Shaw and Yeats created roles for her and Pound poetry about her.
Connection to Bloomsbury
Spent a lot of time in the British Museum Reading Room for her hermetic studies, reading alchemical writings and ancient Egyptian texts.
Female networks
Annie Besant, Annie Horniman, Madame Helena Blavatsky, Henrietta Farr (sister), May Morris, Moina Mathers, Pamela Coman Smith (in America),
Some Works
1894 A Short Inquiry concerning the Hermetic Art by a Lover of Philatethes, a philosophical paper of alchemy.
1894 The Dancing Faun, first novel.
1896 Egyptian Magic: Occult Mysteries in Ancient Egypt
1896 Euphrates or The Waters of The East
1900 The Way of Wisdom: Being an Invetigation on the Meaning of the Letters of the Hebrew Alphabetic Considered as a Remnant of Chaldean Wisdom
1909 The Music of Speech
1910 Modern Woman: Her Intentions
1912 The Solemnization of Jacklin: some Adventures on the Search for Reality
Further Reading
Florence Farr, Bernard Shaw and W B Yeats; Bax C (ed), 1941 The Cuala Press)
Farr, Florence – Archives Hub (jisc.ac.uk)
Florence Farr papers are held at Senate House Library, University of London. University of London Archives | Details | Florence Farr papers
‘Wisdom is a gift given to the Wise’1: Florence Farr (1860–1917): New Woman, Actress and Pagan Priestess
« La Sagesse est un don offert aux sages ». Florence Farr (1860-1917) : New Woman, actrice et prêtresse païenne
Muriel Pécastaing-Boissière
The Feminist Occult in Florence Farr’s Dancing Faun — Staging decadence
