Mary Victoria Cowden Clarke (née Novello) (1809-98)

Media credit University of Leeds

Mary Victoria Cowden Clarke (née Novello) was the eldest child of Vincent Novello and Mary Sabilla Novello. She was born on 22 June 1809 at 240 Oxford Street in London. She was known as ‘Vicky’ to distinguish her from her mother. She was mostly educated by her parents and their literary and musical circle. Mary Lamb taught her Latin, poetry and introduced her to Shakespeare. She learnt French at Mr Bonneyfoy’s School in Boulogne from 1824-5.

She was engaged to Charles Cowden Clarke—one of the family’s lodgers—on 1 November 1826. He was known to the family as ‘Charley’. They married on 5 July 1828 at Bloomsbury Church when she was 21.

She became a writer and editor with a great interest in literature. She sang as a counter tenor alongside her family and acted in amateur theatrical productions across England and Scotland, including performances directed by Charles Dickens. She edited the Musical Times from 1853 to 1856 and published a number of songs and translations through her brother (Joseph) Alfred Novello. She published the Complete Concordance to Shakespeare after 12 years of research in 1844-5 and became a noted Shakespeare scholar.

In 1856 she moved to Maison Quaglia in Nice with her husband and brother (Joseph) Alfred Novello and in 1861 to Villa Novello in Genoa, Italy. She wrote a biography of her father, The Life and Labours of Vincent Novello (1864). After the death of her husband in 1877 she often travelled back to London to complete and supervise the publication of his final writings.

Her brother (Joseph) Alfred Novello left his estate of £63,386 2s. 10d. to her and her sister Sabilla and she in turn left her estate to Sabilla. She published an autobiography in 1896 and died at Villa Novello on 12 January 1898.