瑞克里芙·霍尔

拉德克利夫·霍尔（英语：Radclyffe Hall，1880年8月12日—1943年10月7日），本名玛格莉特·拉德克利夫-霍尔（Marguerite Radclyffe-Hall），英国诗人与作家，以女同性恋小说名著《寂寞之井》著名。

生平

1880年，玛格莉特·拉德克利夫·霍尔出生于汉普郡伯恩茅斯（今多塞特郡），父亲富裕而风流，母亲则吵杂、好口角。霍尔仍在襁褓时双亲便离异，后来长期被母亲与继父忽视，成长过程孤独而寂寞。霍尔攻读于伦敦国王学院，随后前往德国。

霍尔是位女同性恋者，并引用哈维洛克·艾利斯与其他世纪之交之性学家的文章的词语，称己为“天生倒错者”。

1907年在德国霍姆堡温泉城时，霍尔结识了知名的业余德国艺术歌曲歌手玛贝尔·巴登。巴登艺名“蕾蒂亚”，当年51岁，与27岁的霍尔相差了24岁之多，已婚且有一成年女儿与孙子。两人一见钟情，并在巴登丈夫死后开始同居。巴登为霍尔取了一个绰号“约翰”，而霍尔余生也常以“约翰”自称。

1915年，霍尔与巴登的表妹乌娜·杜鲁布里奇（1887-1963）坠入爱河。乌娜是一位雕塑家，同时也是海军将官之妻，育有一女。玛贝尔·巴登于翌年过世，霍尔与乌娜则在1917年开始同居，一直到霍尔离世。

John Radclyffe-Hall (12 August 1880 – 7 October 1943), born as Marguerite Antonia Radclyffe-Hall and also known by her pen name Radclyffe Hall, was an English poet and author best known for her novel The Well of Loneliness (1928), a groundbreaking work in lesbian literature.

Early life

John Radclyffe-Hall was born as Marguerite Antonia in 1880 at "Sunny Lawn", Durley Road, Bournemouth, Hampshire (now Dorset), to Radclyffe ("Rat") Radclyffe-Hall and Mary Jane Sager (née Diehl). Hall's father was a wealthy philanderer educated at Eton and Oxford. He seldom worked, as he had inherited a large sum of money from his father, an eminent physician who was head of the British Medical Association. Her mother was an unstable American widow from Philadelphia. In 1882, Hall's father abandoned the family, but left behind a considerable inheritance for her.

Hall's mother subsequently married Albert Visetti, a professor of singing. She did not like her new stepfather, and despised her mother, who often dipped into Hall's inheritance for herself. Throughout her childhood, Mary made it clear that Hall was unwanted, as she had failed to get an abortion during pregnancy.

As Hall grew older and gained more autonomy, she realised that she had enough inheritance money from her father to live without working or marrying. She began to do as she pleased, dressing in typical men's fashion of the times, such as trousers, monocles and hats. Hall was a lesbian, but described herself as a "congenital invert", a term taken from the writings of Havelock Ellis and other turn-of-the-century sexologists. She spent much of her twenties pursuing women she eventually lost to marriage.

A 27-year-old Hall met Mabel Batten (1856–1916), a well-known amateur singer of Lieder, in 1907 at the Bad Homburg spa in Germany. Batten, nicknamed "Ladye," was 51 years old, and was married with an adult daughter and grandchildren. They fell in love and set up residence together after Batten's husband died. Batten introduced Hall to a circle of artistic and intellectual women, many of them lesbians. She also was the first to call Hall "John", after noting her resemblance to one of Hall's male ancestors, and Hall used this name for the rest of her life. Batten encouraged Hall to begin seeking publishing for her poetry.

In 1915, Hall fell in love with Batten's cousin, Una Troubridge (1887–1963). Troubridge was a sculptress, the wife of Vice-Admiral Ernest Troubridge, and the mother of a young daughter. Troubridge and Hall would be lovers for the remainder of their lives. The romance caused tension between Batten, Hall, and Troubridge until Batten died in 1916. Upon her death, Hall had Batten's corpse embalmed and a silver crucifix blessed by the pope laid on it. Hall, Batten, and Troubridge were "undeterred by the Church's admonitions on same-sex relationships. Hall's Catholicism sat beside a life-long attachment to spiritualism and reincarnation." In 1917, Radclyffe Hall and Una Troubridge began living together. From 1924 to 1929 they lived at 37 Holland Street, Kensington, London. The relationship lasted until Hall's death.

Career

After a period of travel and education, Hall published five books of poetry between 1906 and 1915.

Hall's first novel was The Unlit Lamp, published in 1924 under the name Radclyffe Hall. It follows Joan Ogden, a young girl who dreams of setting up a flat in London with her friend Elizabeth in a Boston marriage. She is studying to become a doctor, but feels trapped by her manipulative mother's emotional dependence on her. Its length and grimness made it a difficult book to sell, so Hall deliberately chose a lighter theme for her next novel, a social comedy entitled The Forge (1924). While she had used her full name for her early poetry collections, she shortened it to M. Radclyffe Hall for The Forge. The book was a modest success, making the John O'London's Weekly bestseller list.