| Contents |
The Noels, Milbankes, Byrons and Kings -- Annabella -- Ada -- Visions -- The making and breaking of a reputation. |
| Contents |
The Noels, Milbankes, Byrons and Kings -- Part one: Annabella. Anticipation (1761-92) ; A very fine child (1792-1810) ; The siege of Annabella (1810-12) ; Entering the lists (1812-13) ; An epistolary courtship (1813-14) ; A sojourn in hell (January to March 1815) ; Unlucky for some: 13 Piccadilly Terrace (1815-16) ; The separation (1816) ; In the public eye (1816-24) -- Part two: Ada. In search of a father ; A rainbow's arc (1829-35) ; Mathematical friendships (1834-5) ; Ada's marriage (1835-40) ; An unconventional wife (1836-40) ; Ambitions and delusions (1840-1) ; A cuckoo in the nest (1841-3) ; My fair interpretress (1843-4) -- Part three: Visions. The enchantress (1843-4) ; The lady from Porlock (1844-9) ; Vanity Fair (1847-50) ; The hand of the past (1850-1) ; Rainbow's end (1851-2) ; Life after Ada (1852-3) -- Part four: The making and breaking of a reputation. Enshrinement (1853--60) ; Outcast -- Timeline of events -- Note on Ada's health. |
| Abstract |
"A masterful portrait of two remarkable women, revealing how two turbulent lives were always haunted by the dangerously enchanting, quicksilver spirit of that extraordinary father whom Ada never knew: Lord Byron."--Amazon. |
| Abstract |
1815. Annabella Milbanke married the notorious Lord Byron. Just one year later she fled, taking with her their baby daughter, the future Ada Lovelace. Byron himself escaped into exile and died as a revolutionary hero in 1824, aged 36. The one thing he had asked his wife to do was to make sure that their daughter never became a poet. Introduced to mathematics as a means of calming her wild spirits, Ada combined that discipline with astronomy and a visionary imagination. She amplified her explanations of Charles Babbage's unbuilt calculating engine to predict the dawn of the modern computer age. Seymour reveals the ways in which Byron, long after his death, continued to shape the lives and reputations both of his wife and his daughter. -- adapted from jacket. |
| Abstract |
"A masterful portrait of two remarkable women, revealing how their turbulent lives were always haunted by the quicksilver spirit of Lord Byron. In 1815, the clever, courted, and cherished Annabella Milbanke married the notorious Lord Byron. Just one year later, she fled, taking with her their baby daughter, the future Ada Lovelace. Byron himself escaped into exile and died as a revolutionary hero in 1824, aged thirty-six. The one thing he had asked his wife to do was to make sure that their daughter never became a poet. Ada didn't. Brought up by a mother who became one of the most progressive reformers of Victorian England, Byron's little girl was introduced to mathematics as a means of calming her wild spirits. Educated by some of the most learned minds in England, she combined that scholarly discipline with a rebellious heart and a visionary imagination. As a child invalid, Ada dreamed of building a steam-driven flying horse. As an exuberant and boldly unconventional young woman, she amplified her explanations of Charles Babbage's unbuilt calculating engine to predict--as nobody would do for another century--the dawn of the modern computer age. When Ada died--like her father, she was only thirty-six--great things seemed still to lie ahead for her as a passionate astronomer. Even while mired in debt from gambling and crippled by cancer, she was frenetically employing Faraday's experiments with light refraction to explore the analysis of distant stars. Miranda Seymour has written a masterful portrait of two remarkable women, revealing how two turbulent lives were often governed and always haunted by the dangerously enchanting, quicksilver spirit of that extraordinary father whom Ada never knew."--Dust jacket. |
| Bibliography note | Includes bibliographical references (pages 479-483) and index. |
| Genre/form | Biographies. |
| Genre/form | Biography. |
| Genre/form | Biographies. |
| ISBN | 9781681778723 (hardcover) |
| ISBN | 1681778726 (hardcover) |
