Discovering Dorothea

As I have often said, I am a greedy reader.  I read something every day, and often several somethings.  I read fiction and non-fiction; literature and agreeable trash.  There are few genres I won't read (none spring to mind) but biographies, autobiographies, memoirs and diaries are always on my go-to list.

I am endlessly fascinated by people.  I don't always like them, and I certainly don't always like what they do, but I am fascinated just the same.  Curiosity is one of my defining characteristics.

While the house was in chaos with the platoons of tradies I continued to read.  And this book reminded me of just what I love about biographies.  Education and delight packed into a compact package...

 

 I grew to love Dorothea, someone about whom I knew less than nothing before I picked up this book.

In 1898, aged nineteen she marched into the Natural History Museum in South Kensington and demanded a job.  Despite the prejudice against women scientists, and no little opposition from her family her association with the museum lasted more than fifty years and only ended with her death in 1951.  Her contribution to the then brand new discipline of Paleontology was huge.  And over the years, this self taught driven woman carved out an international reputation for scientific excellence.

In the early 1900s she explored Cyprus, Crete, Majorca and Menorca.  In remote caves and sea battered cliffs she discovered fossil evidence of extinct creatures including dwarf elephants and hippos, swans too large to fly and giant dormice.  She developed intelligent theories about the changing face of the landscape and of the climate.  As I read I thought that she was certainly one of the very first to investigate climate change and its impact.

And there were other gems to revel in.  Did you know that the myth of Cyclops probably developed from the fossilised remains of an elephant?  That eye in the centre of the forehead was the explanation for the hole in the skull left by the trunk? 

Thirty years later she was excavating in Bethlehem,  in the midst of growing threats of war.  Later, into Africa.  And she continued to work, to learn and to grow. 

How many of us can take an interest and turn it into a passion and career - with very little encouragement and plenty of opposition?  Such a determined woman, with courage and persistence in every thing she undertook.  Very little is known about her private life - which appears to have been sublimated first to her family and then her career.  And I love her successes and hope she knew towards the end of her life just how highly her professionalism and achievements were regarded.

More than fifty years after her death the Natural History Museum employed the actress Jane Cartwright to re-create her as a 'Gallery Character'.  In the company of Charles Darwin and other scientists Dorothea now haunts the galleries of the Museum in school holidays sharing stories of her scientific achievements and hopefully inspiring others to follow their dreams...

I am so very grateful that I picked this book up, and loved reducing my ignorance about her life, her times and her achievements.

So much to learn...

I am a greedy reader and, as I have often said, biographies. autobiographies and memoirs are among my favourite reading.

However while I am greedy, I am also selective about which biographies I read.  Celebrities?  Not as a rule.  Sportspersons?  Ditto.

Writers, often.  Artists.  More women than men.  And travellers, particularly women travellers, capture my interest very rapidly.  If the travel takes place in a country/culture/time which is foreign to me, it is almost a done deal.

Over the years I have read a lot of travel memoirs and biographies of the travellers.    Among my Christmas hoarde this year was 'A Time in Arabia' by Doreen Ingrams.

I picked it up with eager anticipation, and was flummoxed in the introduction!!!

Doreen Ingram was compared (favourably) to Freya Stark, and Mabel Bent.  And my ignorance was exposed mercilessly.  I have several books by Freya Stark, and others about her.  And I had never heard of either Doreen Ingrams or Mabel Bent.

Doreen travelled to what was then South Arabia and is now known as Yemen with her husband, a civil servant, arriving in 1934.  She and her husband had taken the time and the trouble to learn Arabic before they went, and spend as much time as possible living within, not apart from the communities.  She worked both with her husband and independently promoting peace, education and women's rights.

And there is a lot of charm in her writing too.  How do you identify your cloak from all the other identical black and shapeless garments?  By the lingering smell of your own perfume...

And when she arrived she was childless.  'One of the Sherifas asked if I had any children of my own flesh and blood, and when I said no, she took my coffee cup, spat in it, and handed it back saying "I am a Sherifa, if you drink this you will have a child"'.  She did drink it, and did have a child - who travelled with her, with an abandoned child she adopted.

Having finished the book, I am now determined to find out more about her - and about Mabel Bent too.  So much to learn, so many books, so little time...

A pointless gesture?

This post is prompted by one of the books I picked up from a book fair on election day.  It is a biography of an Australian poet, Shelton Lea, about whom I knew nothing.

I expected to be intrigued, I expected to learn things.  I did not expect to be filled with ballistic and impotent rage.

Shelton Lea was adopted.  Adopted into the Darrell Lea family.  Non-Australian readers may or may not know that Darrell Lea was a privately owned company which made and sold chocolate, liquorice and confectionery.

He was not the only child adopted into the Darrell Lea dynasty.  His adoptive parents were wealthy and their money spoke for them.  Valerie, the matriarch of the family adopted three children - to be playmates for her own children because 'Two dogs play better than one.'

Based on her treatment of the children she adopted I don't think she should have been allowed to adopt anything which needed more care than a house brick.  

She had difficulties with Shelton, and when he was three (three for goodness sake) took him for psychiatric assessment at a residential centre for children with intellectual and psychiatric problems.  He was watched and tested over several months and the doctors came to the conclusion that the problem did not lie with the child.  This finding was supported by other agencies over the years - and they left Shelton and the other adopted children where they were.  Grr.

Needless to say Valerie did not agree.  She drugged him, she slapped him ('he needs a good whack a day').  I cannot comprehend the emotional damage that being constantly belittled, punished and blamed for everything - without proof, would have had. 

The other adoptive children seemed to fare a little better.  But only a little. Shelton was the scapegoat but they were also treated badly.  It was made clear to them that they would inherit none of the Lea family wealth.  Presumably being adopted was inheritance enough.   

Shelton was placed in boys homes, imprisoned and turned to drugs and alcohol.  As a teenager in a lock-up he discovered the writings of Era Pound and turned to poetry.

He escaped from his adoptive family early, but spent time on the streets, in boys homes and in prison.  Unsurprisingly his relationships with women were difficult.  He felt rejected by his birth mother and was rejected by his adoptive mother.

As an adult, he plucked up the courage to approach Valerie to ask about his birth mother.  She lied, and effectively denied knowing anything about his mother.  His biographer ultimately tracked her down - ten years after her death.

And here is where the pointless gesture comes in.  If they hadn't gone out of business last year I would have imposed a personal boycott on Darrell Lea products.

I occasionally bought their liquorice for the smaller portion, but didn't like their other products.  I doubt that I would have spent $20 a year on Darrell Lea confectionery.  Insignificant.  And, as a private gesture it would have had even less impact. 

Just the same, if they were still in operation, I would have imposed my personal ban.  A question of conscience perhaps?

PS:  This is not a review, but a rant.  I have some books, some written by other bloggers which I will review (here and on Amazon) but I needed to vent some spleen about a woman who used her money to treat children like a commodity.