A. Garland Mears facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Amelia Garland Mears
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Mears portrait from Idylls, Legends and Lyrics (1890)
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Amelia Garland
1842 |
| Died | 3 January 1920 (aged 77–78) Leeds, England
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| Occupation | novelist |
Amelia Garland Mears (1842–1920) was an Irish novelist. She wrote under the name A. Garland Mears.
Contents
Amelia Mears' Early Life
Amelia Garland Mears was born in Freshford, County Kilkenny, Ireland, in 1842. She grew up with two older sisters, Elizabeth and Jane, and two brothers, John and Charles. Her family moved from Ireland to Liverpool, England, around 1848.
Later, her family moved to Dronfield, Derbyshire. Her father, John Garland, worked as a teacher at the grammar school there for 25 years. He also wrote many poems that were never published.
Her Family Life
In 1864, Amelia married Edward Mears in West Hartlepool. Edward was a businessman who sold hardware, jewelry, and toys. He was born in 1825.
Amelia and Edward had three children: Edward, born in 1865, Amelia Mary, born in 1868, and Edith Jane, born in 1869. Their son Edward was very good at Latin in school.
The family lived in Hartlepool. Amelia loved learning. She spent a lot of time at the Dronfield Public Library. She also took science and literature classes through the Cambridge University Extension Scheme. In 1883, both Amelia and her husband received special certificates for their studies in electricity.
Amelia Mears' Writing Career
Amelia Mears began reading at a very young age, even before she went to school. She became a very productive writer, publishing four novels in just five years, between 1890 and 1895. People described her as a "poet of love and nature." Her writing was greatly inspired by the famous Scottish writer Sir Walter Scott. Besides her novels, she also wrote short stories for different magazines.
Her First Novels
Amelia Mears released her first novel, Idylls, Legends and Lyrics, in 1890. This book was a collection of short stories and poems. It explored old myths and themes about human life and love. She was inspired by her experiences living in West Hartlepool, where she met her husband. In the book's introduction, she wrote about music and hoped her stories would bring "pleasurable contemplation" to readers. The original copy of her first book is kept at the Cornell University Library in Ithaca, New York.
Three years later, in 1893, she published her second novel, The Story of a Trust and Other Tales. This book was released by a new publisher in London. Later that same year, Mears released her third novel, Tales of Our Town.
Mercia, the Astronomer Royal
Amelia Mears is best known for her final published work, Mercia, the Astronomer Royal: A Romance, which came out in 1895. This story is set in a future world in the year 2002. In this future, women and men are completely equal, both physically and socially.
The book tells a romantic story in a future Europe. It is important because of its feminist themes. It showed women in powerful roles in a science-fiction setting. This was quite unusual for books written during the Victorian era.
Later Life and Legacy
Amelia Mears' son, Edward, became a church leader. He was the Rector of St Katherine's Parish in Essex from 1906 to 1940. He also founded St Paul's.
Her daughter, Amelia Mary Mears, also studied science and literature. She worked in a jewelry shop for a while. She never married and lived in Leeds, Yorkshire.
Amelia Mears moved to Leeds after her husband died in 1868. She passed away in Leeds on January 3, 1920, and was buried there.
Her Lasting Impact
Even today, Amelia Mears' work is still being recognized. Her book Mercia, the Astronomer Royal was recently republished in a collection called A Brilliant Void: A Selection of Classic Irish Science Fiction. Even though her work is from the 1800s, it has been described as "anything but old school." People have said that Mears was "finding new ground in sci-fi for over 100 years."
