Charles Dickens' Favorite Daughter: The Life, Loves, and Art of Katey Dickens Perugini - Tapa dura

"This biography was well worth writing and is well worth reading. Katey has never had a book to herself, and she deserves one. The personality that comes through is ardent and likeable... [Hawksley's] biography has the distinction of making you want to know more about its subject, rather than, as so often, less."-John Carey in The Sunday Times "Highly regarded artist with something of a flirty reputation ... the feisty Katey as Lucinda Hawksley makes clear in her gripping biography could not have been less like the drippy and insipid love-object Victorian heroines of Dickens's novels... In old age, Katey entertained a stream of celebrities at her small London flat, including J.M. Barrie and George Bernard Shaw... Katey's [story] is fascinating and enthralling." -Val Hennessy in the Daily Mail

As the daughter of the most famous writer of the time, Katey Dickens enjoyed a high profile in Victorian society. She pursued her love of painting, acted in her father's plays, socialized with the Thackerays, and modeled for painter John Everett Millais. This riveting biography finally sheds light on her extraordinary life both as a Dickens and an artist. The turbulent family life in the Dickens household drove Katey to marry young. Her first husband was the chronically ailing Charlie Collins, brother of the famous author Wilkie Collins. After Charlie's untimely demise, the widowed Katey fell in love and married the handsome Italian artist Carlo Perugini. Charles Dickens lovingly nicknamed Katey "Lucifer Box" because of her fiery temper. In many ways, Katey was ahead of her time; she refused to be eclipsed by her father and fought to establish herself as an artist. She became renowned as a portrait painter and exhibited regularly at the Royal Academy. Katey lived to be almost ninety and her artistic prestige, which flourished during her lifetime, still persists to this day.