Jean Rhys, born Ella Gwendolyn Rees Williams in 1890, was a 20th-century novelist and writer of short stories. Born and raised on the Caribbean island of Dominica, she moved to England at age 16, became a chorus girl, and embarked on the life of a demimondaine there and in Europe. Her deep sense of being an outsider -- the descendant of white colonialists in the Caribbean, then a Creole in England -- never left her and deeply informed her work.
Rhys's evocative sketches in the 1920s caught the eye, and briefly earned the patronage, of Ford Madox Ford (her fraught relationship with him is explored in her debut novel, Quartet [1928]). She is best known for her novel Wide Sargasso Sea (1966), which examined the character of Bertha Rochester (in Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre) from a different angle.
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Subjects
Fiction, British and irish fiction (fictional works by one author), Fiction, general, Fiction, short stories (single author), Rhys, jean, 1894-1979, English Novelists, Novelists, English, Biography, Correspondence, English literature, Manners and customs, Social life and customs, Authors, Continental european fiction (fictional works by one author), English, English Short stories, English Women novelists, Fiction, classics, Fiction, women, Imprisonment, Large type books, Man-woman relationships, Married people, Paris (france), fiction, Short storiesPlaces
Paris (France), Caribbean Area, Dominica, England, West Indies, British West Indies, Caribbean, Coulibri, Europe, France, Granbois, Jamaica, London, London (England), Thornfield Hall-
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ID Numbers
- OLID: OL4397788A
- ISNI: 0000000118278981
- VIAF: 100237135
- Wikidata: Q230598
- Inventaire.io: wd:Q230598
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Alternative names
- Jean Rhys
- Rui Si (Rhys, Jean, 1894-1979)
- Rhys Jean
- Ella Gwendolyn Rees Williams
| March 18, 2023 | Edited by Doro Wynant | The wikipedia bio is too short and somewhat inaccurate. Wide Sargasso Sea was not written as a "prequel" to Jane Eyre; rather, Rhys identified with Bertha -- as a Creole and as an exploited woman -- and chose to write Bertha's story. I've studied Rhys's work for 30 yrs, and I know these biographical details very well. |
| September 27, 2020 | Edited by MARC Bot | add ISNI |
| February 27, 2020 | Edited by Tom Morris | Add AKA |
| February 12, 2020 | Edited by Lisa | merge authors |
| August 31, 2008 | Created by ImportBot | Imported from Talis MARC record. |