Selina Bunbury | |
---|---|
Born | 1802 Castlebellingham, County Louth |
Died | 1882 Cheltenham |
Occupation | Writer |
Selina Bunbury (1802–1882) was an Anglo-Irish novelist and traveler.
Selina Bunbury was born at Kilsaran Rectory near Castlebellingham, County Louth.[1][2] She was a twin, and one of fifteen children of a Protestant minister, Rev. Henry Bunbury.[3][4] The Bunbury family moved to Dublin in 1819, and to Liverpool about 1830.[5]
Bunbury was a prolific author,[1] writing nearly a hundred volumes of both fiction and non-fiction, for young readers and a general audience, beginning with Visit to my Birthplace (1821).[6] Her writing had "a strong proselytizing and moral component".[4] "Miss Bunbury is an experienced, an observant, and a discriminating traveller," commented an 1853 reviewer, "with but one fault we can discover — a violent Tractarian tinge, which, however, does not render her book less amusing."[7]
Bunberry traveled from Stockholm to Rome in 1847 and 1848, becoming a first-hand witness to revolution and upheaval in several parts of Europe.[8] Her travel writing included My Early Adventures During the Peninsular Campaign of Napoleon (1834),[9] Evenings in the Pyrenees (1845),[10] A visit to the catacombs, or first Christian cemeteries of Rome, and a midnight visit to mount Vesuvius (1849),[11] Evelyn, or, A journey from Stockholm to Rome in 1847-48 (1849),[12] Life in Sweden (1853),[13] A Summer in Northern Europe (1856),[14] Russia After the War (1857)[15] and My First Travels (1859).[16]
Some of her books continued to be published long after her death in 1882, including American editions of Fanny, the flower girl, or Honesty rewarded (1911).[17]
Bunbury kept house for her twin brother until he married in 1845.[5] She died in 1882 at her nephew's home in Cheltenham, aged 80 years.[1][8]