By : Anna Cora Mowatt Ritchie (1819 - 1870)
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Anna Cora Ogden was born in Bordeaux, France, March 5, 1819. She was the tenth of fourteen children. Her father was Samuel Gouveneur Ogden (1779–1860), an American merchant. Her mother was Eliza Lewis Ogden (1785–1836), granddaughter of Francis Lewis, a signatory to the United States Declaration of Independence. In 1826, when Anna was six years old, the Ogden family returned to the United States. She attended private schools but was primarily educated at home. From a young age she was encouraged to read and showed a passion for writing and acting.
On October 6, 1834, at age 15, Anna Cora Ogden eloped with James Mowatt (1805–1849), a prominent and wealthy New York lawyer. They moved to an estate in Flatbush, New York, where her husband encouraged her to continue her education and to write. She wrote of her elopement:
What could a girl of fifteen know of the sacred duties of a wife? With what eyes could she comprehend the new and important life she was entering? She had known nothing but childhood–had scarcely commenced her girlhood. What could she comprehend of the trials, the cares, the hopes, the responsibilities of womanhood? I thought of none of these things. I had always been lighthearted to the point of frivolity. I usually made a jest of everything–yet I did not look on this matter as a frolic. I only remembered I was keeping a promise. I had perfect faith in the tenderness of him to whom I confided myself. I did not in the least realize the novelty of my situation.
Anna Cora Mowatt's first book, Pelayo, or The Cavern of Covadonga, was published in 1836, then Reviewers Reviewed in 1837 using the pseudonym "Isabel". She wrote articles which were published in Graham's Magazine and Godey's Lady's Book and other periodicals. She wrote a six-act play, Gulzara, which was published in New World. Under the pseudonym Henry C. Browning, she wrote a biography of Goethe. Using the pseudonym "Helen Berkley", she wrote two novels: The Fortune Hunter and Evelyn. Evelyn is written in the epistolary style. In 1841, due to financial problems, Anna became a public reader. Her first performance was attended by Edgar Allan Poe, who wrote of her, "A more radiantly beautiful smile is quite impossible to conceive." Her readings were popular and well attended, but her career as a reader was short lived due to respiratory problems. While recovering from her illness, she returned to her writing.
In 1845, her best-known work, the play Fashion was published. It received rave reviews and opened at the Park Theatre, New York, on March 24, 1845. On June 13, 1845, she made another career move to acting, she debuted at the Park Theatre as Pauline in The Lady of Lyons with great success. Although her next play, Armand, the Child of the People was published in 1847, and also received good reviews, she continued in her acting career. She performed leading roles in Shakespeare (for instance, in a production of Cymbeline in London, 1843), melodramas, and her own plays. She toured the United States and Europe for the next eight years.
On February 15, 1851, her husband, James Mowatt died. After a short break she resumed her acting career. In December 1853, her book Autobiography of an Actress was published. Anna Cora Mowatt's last appearance on the public stage was June 3, 1854.
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