'I wrote for...'

'I wrote for women whose lives consisted only of work and sorrow.'

- says the text for this week's calendar page. by hedwig courts-mahler in memory of the sixtieth anniversary of her death.

hedwig courts-mahler. the name is familiar. i came across it again and again in the verneered book shelf that i browsed as a little girl. along with other names and titles who proclaimed promise, love and tragedy in equal measure if preferably not in that order.

i also remember my mother's comments... 'och, that stupid woman and her stupid stories' - if not that phrase, then something to a very similar effect. h c-m nonetheless was her mother's best-loved author and so, my granny duly devoured her many writitings, even if all of them were so same.

how strange to stumble across this writer again. how strange also to reconsider my granny, as well as my mother's rejection in the light of the quote above.

'fairytales for adults' advertises the publisher; i think of something else as it resonates with a current writing that is being finalised for print in december. here's a mental note to this effect.