Letters Shedding Light on the Relationship Between Constance Naden and Madeline Daniell

Abstract

The relationship between poet and philosopher Constance Naden (1858–1889) and her close companion Madeline Daniell (1832–1906) has been the subject of critical speculation. Lyssa Randolph has argued that Daniell’s biographical essays about Naden were written ‘from the countercultural space of “romantic friendship”’, and Virginia Blain includes Naden in a list of Victorian women poets ‘who appear less orientated […] towards the fulfilment of heterosexual desire’. ¹ While Blain emphasized ‘a desperate need for more recovery work, especially in the area of lesbian poetry’ in 1999, it has not been straightforward to undertake such work in the case of Naden. ² Posthumous biographies written by friends, the most extensive of which is Constance Naden: A Memoir (1890), do not refer to, or even imply, the existence of any romantic attachments. ³ Furthermore, Naden was notoriously private about her personal life; there are only two letters attributable to her, no diaries from...