Lord Ronald Gower
Lord Ronald Charles Sutherland-Leveson-Gower (2 August 1845 – 9 March 1916), known as Lord Ronald Gower, was a Scottish Liberal politician, sculptor and writer[1] from the Leveson-Gower family.
Biography
The youngest son of George, 2nd Duke of Sutherland by his wife Lady Harriet Howard, daughter of George, Earl of Carlisle, he was educated at Eton and at Trinity College, Cambridge.[2]
He was a Liberal Member of Parliament for Sutherland from 1867–1874, and was succeeded as MP by his nephew Cromartie, Marquess of Stafford (the elder surviving son of his eldest brother the 3rd Duke of Sutherland). He was a Trustee of the National Portrait Gallery, and of the Birthplace and Shakespeare Memorial Building at Stratford-on-Avon.
Creative work
A sculptor, he also published a number of works on the fine arts. His most important sculpture was the statue of Shakespeare and four of his principal characters, erected in Stratford-upon-Avon. He also created a sculpture depicting Marie Antoinette on her way to the scaffold and another of a member of the Old Guard at Waterloo.
He also wrote biographies of Marie Antoinette and Joan of Arc, and a history of the Tower of London.[3]
Personal life
He never married, and was well known among the homosexual community of the time. Oscar Wilde's story The Portrait of Mr. W. H. has been interpreted as a comment on Gower's social circle, and Gower is generally identified as the model for Lord Henry Wotton in The Picture of Dorian Gray.[4] In 1879 hints of his homosexual liaisons published in the journal Man of the World led Gower to sue the paper, but later in the year the Prince of Wales sent him a letter accusing him of being "a member of an association for unnatural practices", to which Gower wrote an angry reply.[4] John Addington Symonds, who stayed with him once, stated that Gower "saturates one's spirit in Urningthum [homosexuality] of the rankest most diabolical kind".[4]
Gower's most notable lover was the journalist Frank Hird, a relationship that lasted to the end of his life. Gower adopted Hird as his son, leading Wilde to remark on one occasion, "Frank may be seen, but not Hird."[5]
Notes
- ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
- ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
- ↑ http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?_r=1&res=9906E0D91F38E633A25753C1A9659C946796D6CF&oref=slogin
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 David Getsy, Sculpture and the Pursuit of a Modern Ideal in Britain, C. 1880-1930, Asgate, London, 2004, p.64.
- ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
External links
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to [[commons:Lua error in Module:WikidataIB at line 506: attempt to index field 'wikibase' (a nil value).|Lua error in Module:WikidataIB at line 506: attempt to index field 'wikibase' (a nil value).]]. |
- Works by Lord Ronald Gower at Project Gutenberg
- Lua error in Module:Internet_Archive at line 573: attempt to index field 'wikibase' (a nil value).
- Biography at Centre for Whistler Studies
- Website suggesting link to Oscar Wilde
- Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by Lord Ronald Leveson-Gower
| Parliament of the United Kingdom | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by | Member of Parliament for Sutherland 1867–1874 |
Succeeded by Marquess of Stafford |
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- 1845 births
- 1916 deaths
- LGBT politicians from Scotland
- People educated at Eton College
- Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for Scottish constituencies
- Liberal Party (UK) MPs
- UK MPs 1865–68
- UK MPs 1868–74
- Younger sons of dukes
- Leveson-Gower family
- Scottish Liberal Party MPs
- Sutherland
- Politics of Highland (council area)
- Alumni of Trinity College, Cambridge
- Scottish sculptors
- Scottish writers
- Place of birth missing
- 19th-century Scottish people
- Scottish art critics
- Scottish biographers
- Gay politicians
- 20th-century British sculptors
- 19th-century British sculptors
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