Mary Taylor – författare

In Elizabeth Gaskell's seminal biography The Life of Charlotte Brontë, Gaskell makes extensive use of Charlotte's correspondence with her closest friend, known to readers of that work simply as `Dear M.' `M.' was later identified as Mary Taylor, whom Charlotte met as a teenager at boarding school (the school used as the model for `Lowood' in Jane Eyre) with whom she remained friends for life. It was Mary Taylor who inspired Charlotte to leave her oppressive parsonage home and go off to school in Brussels and, again, who came to her rescue when that adventure went sour and Charlotte was paralysed by her unrequited love for her language teacher. Mary herself led a much less restricted life. She horrified her friends by teaching at a boys' school in Germany and then by setting off for New Zealand with her younger brother in order to earn her own living. She eventually became a feminist essayist, urging women to work to support themselves as their `first duty,' and she chided her friend Charlotte as a `coward and a traitor' for not being equally clear-headed about the debilitating effects of economic dependancy.In Miss Miles, her only novel, she breaks with tradition by producing a work which depicts women's friendships as sustaining life and sanity in oppressive situations as well as introducing an innovative narrative form which Janet Murray calls a `feminist bildungsroman': the story of the education of several heroines, emphasizing their friendship and their economic and mental well-being rather than their love-lives.

Homes by Association is a book that gives readers a clear, engaging understanding of the origins and progression of housing associations in Scotland since the 1970s, before and after devolution. Whether you work in housing, policy, community development, or are simply interested in how not-for-profit organisations can deliver public good, this book helps you make sense of a sector that now boasts nearly 150 associations providing homes for around half a million people across Scotland. You will gain insight into how associations evolved from small, often community-led initiatives into diverse, professional organisations operating in cities, towns, rural areas and islands, and across every type of housing imaginable, meeting some of the highest standards possible. Why this book is valuable for readersWritten by people who have researched, managed and worked inside this sector so can offer informed, real-world perspectivesEnriched with photographs, case examples and insights from leading practitioners, backed up by published material and data on recent trends and statisticsProvides a timely, practical look at a not-for-profit model sector contributing to public good, offering positive business and governance model given the crisis of public services in many places today.Homes by Association helps readers understand not just what housing associations are, but what they can teach us about resilient organisations, community-focused leadership and building homes—and systems—that last.

Rustington is a village on the Sussex plain between the South Downs and the sea. This book recounts the story of its long history in a wealth of historic photographs, almost entirely chosen from the author's collection.