ABSTRACT
Anna Eliza Bray was an historical novelist who originally wanted to be either an artist or an actress. She is now largely forgotten, but important to this anthology as an autobiographer with vivid and quirky memories of her childhood emotions, friendships, reading and education. The only daughter of John Kempe, a bullion-carrier for the Royal Mint, and his wife Ann Morrow, who had one other child, Alfred, she often benefited from her brother's help in advancing her education, and giving her the confidence to read aloud and act parts from Shakespeare. Bray's early life was beset by a series of false starts aborted by ill-health and other kinds of misfortune. After what she calls 'a very miscellaneous education at home' until the age of 10, she was sent to her godmother's school, but left two years later after contracting rheumatic fever.
