Mabel Ferrett
Born
Mabel Frankland

(1917-04-30)30 April 1917[1][2][3]
Ossett, West Riding of Yorkshire[1]
Died28 January 2011(2011-01-28) (aged 93)[1][2]
NationalityBritish
Occupation(s)Poet, publisher, literary editor and local historian[1]
OrganizationThe Pennine Poets
SpouseHarold Ferrett[1][2]
Childrenone[1][2]

Mabel Ferrett (1917-2011) was a British poet, publisher, literary editor and local historian. She was one of the founders of the long-established Pennine Poets writing group.[1] She established the Fighting Cock Press to publish work by northern authors.[1]

Personal life

She was born Mabel Frankland in Ossett, West Riding of Yorkshire.[1] She attended Ossett Grammar School and became a teacher.[1][2] She married in 1947 and thereafter lived in Heckmondwike, also in West Yorkshire.[1][2] Ferrett died in 2011 aged 93.[1][2][4]

Career

Ferrett started the Pennine Poets writing group in 1966 in Elland, West Yorkshire.[1] She founded the Fighting Cock Press in 1973.[1] She edited the journal of the Pennine Poets, Pennine Platform, between 1973 and 1976, and Orbis poetry magazine between 1978 and 1980.[1][5][6]

Her own poetry won awards including the Julia Cairns award for poetry from the Society of Women Writers and Journalists.[1] Her poetry was often on historical themes.[1] She also wrote for local magazines and newspapers, including The Yorkshire Post.[1][5] Her historical novel about Chartism in the Spen Valley was dramatised on BBC Radio 4.[5][7]

Ferrett worked at the Red House Museum in Gomersal and also as a teacher.[2][5] During the war she taught under challenging conditions at Armley National School in Leeds.[1][5]

She was a founder member of the Spen Valley Historical Society.[2][5] She was particularly known for her work on the Brontës and their circle.[1][4]

Bibliography

  • The Lynx-Eyed Strangers (1956) (poetry)
  • The Angry Men (1965) (historical novel)
  • The Tall Tower (1970) (poetry)
  • The Years of the Right Hand (1975) (poetry)
  • Shirley Country (1973), republished as The Brontës in the Spen Valley (1978) (non-fiction)
  • The Humber Bridge: selected poems 1955-1985 (1986)
  • The Taylors of the Red House (1987)
  • "Shirley by Charlotte Brontë: The Importance of Proper Names," Transactions of the Yorkshire Dialect Society (1988)
  • A Short History of Hartshead (1993) (non-fiction)
  • Scathed Earth: selected poems (1996)
  • Imaginary Gates (2001) (poetry)
  • After Passchendaele: A Writer’s War (2003) (autobiography)
  • Spirit and Emotion (2006) (non-fiction)

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 Kirk, Pauline (17 February 2011). "Mabel Ferrett obituary". The Guardian. Retrieved 13 August 2020.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 "Obituary: Mabel Ferrett". Yorkshire Live. 8 February 2011. Retrieved 13 August 2020.
  3. ↑ Geoffrey Handley-Taylor (1977). International Who's who in Poetry. International Biographical Centre. ISBN 978-0-900332-42-5. Retrieved 13 August 2020.
  4. 1 2 Popplewell, Mike (17 February 2017). "Books of Bronte brilliance". The Press. Retrieved 13 August 2020.
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 6 "Mabel Ferrett". Yorkshire Post. 12 February 2011. Retrieved 13 August 2020.
  6. ↑ Wolfgang Görtschacher (1993). Little Magazines Profiles: The Little Magazines in Great Britain, 1939-1993. University of Salzburg. ISBN 978-3-7052-0608-3. Retrieved 13 August 2020.
  7. ↑ "Radio Times Listings". BBC Genome. BBC Radio Times. 1969. Retrieved 13 August 2020.
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