To be honest, I did not know much about this book before I started reading it. I was intrigued by the description and the book cover.

I Used to Live Here Once is such a profound read full of excellent research and information and written in a way that you completely forget that you are reading nonfiction.

A beautiful book that everyone should read!

Stunningly well-researched biography, should be extremely interesting to lovers of Jean Rhys and her work.

I met Jean Rhys in a dream.

I asked her what she disliked about death and she said, there are no fur coats in heaven.

She had become friends with DJ Screw and sometimes they played cribbage and talked about barbiturates. Jean used to play her favorite records at half-speed so they'd last longer too.

Jean and DJ Screw most like laying under an elm tree over by the frontage road, tightening and loosening muscles feeling like they're back on luminal and lean. They like to listen to the crabgrass grow.

The trick to this place, she says, is remembering what didn't happen.

I Used to Live Here Once, by Miranda Seymour, is a biography about the life of Jean Rhys. I was unfamiliar with Jean Rhys and her work before reading this.. This detailed biography was informative but at times dragged a bit for me. Now, after reading about her life, I feel I must read something that she has written. Thanks, NetGalley and the publisher, for providing me with an ARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

I was not familiar with the author until reading this biography. She gallivanted around Europe, rubbing shoulders with many luminaries amd wrote stories and books.
The biography does a good job in telling her life story, but it did tend to drag in areas.
I did like a;l,the photographs that were included.

Miranda Seymour is a prolific author of fiction as well as marvelous biographies. Her own elegant writing style pulls the reader along in the often rollercoaster lives of her subjects. I Used to Live Here Once is maybe the most tempest-tossed life story she has undertaken. Jean Rhys is most widely known for her novel, Wide Sargasso Sea, which is a brilliantly imagined backstory of Rochester's locked-away wife in Jane Eyre. Rhys could certainly describe the terrors of madness and the euphoria of success from her own lived experience. Reading about her life can be a mostly dark experience due to her mental health problems, addictions, tragic losses, and highly dependent relationships with men who were no more successful at managing their own lives than Rhys was at dealing with hers. Her childhood was dominated by two parents who were polar opposites, her father doting and her mother critical and angry. Rhys' adult life was certainly characterized by a sort of bipolar (not meant in the clinical sense) travel between the emotional extremes of her childhood in Dominica. When Rhys was on her own and unable to support herself as an adult, dear, generous friends took care of her. Her talents and lively personality made her a welcome guest in the homes of writers and artists in the Paris of the 1920s and London over several decades. Reading this book has made me interested in Ms. Seymour's other biographies as well as Jean Rhys’ novels. Books by the latter were republished in 2020.

The only thing I knew about Jean Rhys before reading this book was that she wrote Wide Sargasso Sea, a retelling of Jane Eyre (one of my favorites) from the perspective of the mad woman in the attic. And that she wrote one of my favorite and most memorable opening lines of all time. This is a book that brought Rhys vividly to life, and it definitely inspired me to pick up more of her works soon.

I Used to Live Here Once is a telling biography of Jean Rhys, born Ella Gwendolyn Rees Williams on 24 August 1890. She was white Creole. The story begins in her beloved Dominica, where she spent the first 17 years of her life. She had two brothers and two sisters. She had a fractured relationship with her mother, but she was her father's favorite.

At 17 she left Dominica headed for England for school. Not long after arriving she decided to go into show business. Her name was changed to Ella Gray. It was in her Ella Gray days that she met her first husband, Jean Lenglet, She was 29 years old. He had money and could well support her. But because of a lurid past he couldn't stay in England so he went to Paris. He had asked her to marry him, so he sent for her. Before she left, her previous lover whom she lovingly called Lancy, tried to convince her not to marry Lenglet. He knew about his past and his current troubles, but Ella didn't listen to him. And he was married but didn't bother to tell Ella. So she went to him. They had to be married outside of France because of his previous marriage. Her name became Ella Lenglet .

Not long into her marriage and before they left for Paris she got pregnant. They had to sneak into France because Lenglet's passport was invalid. She was deeply on love with Lenglay. In the beginning of their marriage Jean seemed to have money but it didn't last long. Ella applied for and was hired in a job as an English teacher for children in a private home. She worked there for three months until eight months into her pregnancy. She gave birth to a William Owen Lenglet. Less than a month later he died of pneumonia.

Shortly after the death of their son, the family that Ella had worked for found Jean a lucrative job but he had to move to Vienna. It wasn't long before Ella followed him there. From there they moved to Budapest. While there Ella discovered she was pregnant again. It wasn't long after that that Lenglet confessed that he had gambled away all of the money that he had embezzled from work. Ella had no choice but to ask Lancy for assistance. Shortly thereafter Maryvonne Lenglet was born. Now basically penniless, Maryvonne was placed in an orphanage where she spent her formative years. It was at this time that the French police ordered Lenglet to return to his wife. Ella went back to Paris.

During this time, Ella's ambition was to become a writer. Enter Ford Maddox Ford. Her first attempts were failures, but Ford, an editor, read her work and liked it. He also assisted her financially. It was at this time that Ella changed her name to Jean Rhys. This was her pen name. It took two years but she was eventually published. It's September 1924 and Lenglet was given a well paying job. Now they were able to take two year old Maryvonne out of the orphanage. Again, Lenglet embezzled money from work and was arrested and imprisoned. Maryvonne had to go back to the orphanage.

Rhys visited Lenglet loyally. Since she was short of funds she sold her clothes. By now Rhys had fallen in love with Ford and he with her. Ford was married to Stella, but it was of no consequence. Meanwhile, Lenglet's two year prison sentence was reduced to four months for good behavior. When he was released he was allowed a few days before he was forced to leave France. He went to Belgium. Two years later Jean Lenglet crept into Paris to be with Rhys. He'd been exiled forever. Shortly thereafter, Lenglet was hunted down and again expelled from France.

Rhys went from Paris to London and back. She had a benefactor who was providing funds. She didn't know that it was Ford and Stella. During this time Rhys was becoming more and more dependent on alcohol. And Lenglet regained his Dutch citizenship where he became eligible for state care.

Rhys continued writing. She spent years working on her novels and other pieces. By 1927 Lenglet had returned to the Hague where he reunited with Rhys and five year old Maryvonne. The reunion was relatively brief but Maryvonne remained with her father. Rhys returned to London. Her first full length work of fiction was published in autumn of 1928. Enter Leslie Tilden Smith. He was devoted to promoting Jean Rhys.

Rhys took Maryvonne away for a three month getaway. When she was returned to her father he left her with a madame.

That's book, Quartet, was published by Simon and Schuster and with the proceeds she lavished her daughter with many gifts. In 1929 Jean Rhys found herself having to care for Maryvonne when Lenglet disappeared from Holland. He returned several months later.

Rhys was in somewhat of a relationship with Leslie Tilden Smith. But she left him to return to Paris. In 1931 he was working freelance for his friend's publishing company. Rhys returned to London and was living with Smith in west London. Her second novel had been published and she was working on a third. Since Smith was short on funds due to the US stock market crash, she needed to make money to keep them afloat.

In 1933, Lenglet asked Rhys for a quick divorce so he could marry someone else. Rhys reluctantly consented.

Rhys was drinking so much that her third novel was impeded. While Smith was off to visit his daughter, Rhys holed up in a seaside room above a tearoom to dry out and work for a month.

In September 1933 the divorce was final. Tilden Smith waited until February 1934 to propose. Rhys readily accepted. The couple quarreled incessantly. Their fights even came to blows. But their love for one another was never in question. Their funds were all but nonexistent. Rhys's older brother Owen had moved to London and Rhys waisted no time asking him for a loan.

In 1934 Rhys was drinking so heavily that she couldn't write. And she did poorly when invited to the homes of important people in the literary world. She was quite timid and didn't fair well in crowds of any size.

The death of Leslie's father in 1935 unlocked the remains of Leslie's inheritance. He decided to use some of the money to take Ella Tilden Smith back to her beloved Dominica. A good time was had by Leslie but Ella was grossly dismayed. Racial tension prevailed and many of the landmarks she remembered were boarded up. The crops had been ravaged. When she went to her family home she was devastated to find that it had been torched.

When they got back Rhys went to work on her novel. And then the Tilden Smiths went to New York. Once again relying heavily on alcohol, Jean Rhys was able to blunder through all of the social affairs. Groups always frightened her. She tripped twice and twisted her ankle. This coupled with all of the social engagements caused her volitile temper to spring forth.

Back in London, the persistent pain of her badly swollen foot did nothing to improve her mood. She became cantankerous.

In 1940, Rhys at age 55, was contending with an ailing Leslie. He was not aging well. And her drunken bouts were getting her into trouble. She battled her neighbors and on more than one occasion she had to go to court to resolve her differences. Alcohol had turned her into a monster. In April 1941 Jean Rhys was committed to a mental institution by her husband with her sister Brenda's consent. When she got out she went to live with a vicar and his family. When she left there she went back to Norwich. In 1942 Leslie and Rhys were reunited. But on 2 October 1945 Leslie was dead from a heart attack.

Rhys was destitute. Edward persuaded their sister Brenda's wealthy husband to provide a stipend for her. Enter Max Hammer, Leslie's cousin. Shortly after meeting Rhys, Max started divorce proceedings. Max bought a house and he and Rhys lived together. Oh, and somewhere along the way Maryvonne got married to Job Mormon. Anyway, Max asked Rhys to marry him before his divorce was final. On 2 October 1047 they were married, two years to the day after Leslie died, and just two weeks after Max's divorce. A new name: Ella Hamer.

In 1948 Maryvonne brought her baby girl Ruth Ellen to visit her grandmother. Maryvonne told her mother that they were going to join her husband Job to Java.

Max had hooked up with a silver-tongued jailbird. Rhys was drinking excessively again. By autumn 1948, unemployed Max was getting into some shady dealings with his crook friend. Rhys threatened to leave him because he wasn't bringing in any money. He suggested she rent out part of the house to two couple, which she did. In the meantime, Max found a job. Max's new friend, Mr. Roberts was as crooked as the last one.

Jean had two more bouts with her tenants. They called the police. Her sentence was to see a psychiatrist for three weeks. She returned to court but not before drinking. When asked if she had anything to say, she let the magistrate have it. She was sentenced to the prison for five days and two years probation.

Max had still another friend, Michael Donn. He convinced Max to get him a job at the firm where Max worked. Eventually, Max was charged with attempted fraud, clearly the work of Donn. In light of this, the mortgage company foreclosed on their home. As a means of procuring cash, Rhys sold her precious books. They fetched almost nothing. They rented a room. And then Rhys was told that an anonymous benefactor was providing a small sum to her for an undetermined period.

On 22 May 1950, Max was found guilty and was sentenced to two years in prison. Michael got four years in a different prison. Rhys found herself a place to stay and she stopped drinking. When 70 year old Max walked out of prison in 1952, he was disgraced and disbarred, never again to practice law. His wife, age 62, had not published a word in thirteen years. Rhys talked to a friend to get a job for Max. The mysterious benefactor's assistance ceased. Rhys was living on the meager support from her siblings. In the meantime, Maryvonne was diagnosed with tuberculosis at which point they returned to Holland.

Things began progressing with Rhys's work. It was being read on the air and adaptations we're being made

Like his cousin, Max was not aging well. All the while, in 1961 Rhys became addicted to antidepressants and amphetamines. That coupled with her drinking made for a very difficult woman. As with Leslie, Rhys and Max fought like cats and dogs. The winter of 1962/63 was the coldest on record. Trying to survive in a cold, drafty house, in April 1963 Max's doctor sent him to a clinic on the Devon coast. Max had had a stroke and when he came home in May he suffered another. Back at the hospital, he'd grown very thin. Rhys couldn't handle it. On 11 July Max came home from the hospital. In the beginning of August Rhys returned him to the hospital.

It seemed Jean was delusional. She insisted she was being invaded by vermin. She sent for her daughter, as she found the loneliness unbearable. Francis Wyndham blessed her with 100 pounds in hopes she'd spend it on a much needed rest. Her friend Selma invited her for a visit and told her to bring the book she was working on. Rhys refused stating she was I'll and that she could only work at he.Alwynne Woodard came to the rescue and escorted her once again to the rectory. Before long she was home. On 24 July 1964 her brother admitted her to the hospital. The day after she returned to London she had a heart attack. She spent the next month in the hospital. Her condition was serious. She would require heart medication for the rest of her life. In January she was admitted to a nursing home. By March 1965 she was back home. Max was still layed up in the hospital, semi-contious. The 75 year old Rhys finally visited a doctor and got new meds. .

On 7 March 1966 Max died. And Jeans novel was completed. Rhys wanted Maryvonne to be her care giver but she couldn't. Jean had ongoing problems with her on again off again friend Selma Vaz Dias. She had convinced Rhys to sign over 50% of her earnings among other things. Rhys had no idea what she had signed. Once she found out she was furious. Eventually it all worked out in her favor. She still shyed away from large social gatherings and interviews, but granted a few near the end. At the close of her life, although details are unknown, Jean took a fall. Clearly she was intoxicated. She would up in the hospital. It was late spring 1979. Jean didn't fair well with anesthesia and surgery.

On 14 May 1979 Jean Rhys breathed her last. She'd published four novels and a myriad of other work. Her life was colorful to say the least. She was a difficult woman to contend with, yet brilliant. In this review I left out a great deal about her convoluted relationships. This book gave a realistic perspective on a woman who was not easy to know or contend with. The author did an excellent job bringing her to life. I feel like I had an intimate encounter with Jean Rhys. Thank you NetGalley for this experience.

I should probably give this book 4 stars, but I only read about 40% of it.
It is well-researched and extremely thorough. This is the biography of a female author who was born on the island of Dominica in the late 1800s. I have not read any of the subject's work, nor had I even heard of her. I was interested in this biography because of her childhood in Dominica. I enjoyed that part of the book. Once Rhys left the Caribbean, my interest waned. The story also became ponderous and depressing. This is probably the truth of this woman's life, but without a pressing interest in Jean Rhys, I found her story unenjoyable.
This has nothing to do with the quality of the writing. This biography is obviously well written. Someone who has a stronger interest in Jean Rhys could provide a more accurate review of this book.
Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

For years, I kept hearing about this Jean Rhys and this novel Wide Sargasso Sea. I found a copy of the novel and finally read it, riveted. I loved her reimagining of the ‘mad wife’ in Jane Eyre, Bronte’s story turned into a social commentary about colonialism and the rejection of female sexuality.

That was twenty years or so ago. I knew nothing more about Rhys when I picked up this new biography, I Used To Live Here Once by Miranda Seymour. Her portrait of Rhys is unforgettable and complex, the story of a woman born too soon, who lived passionately and in seclusion, married unwisely for love, plummeted from wealth to poverty, and rose to fame to forgotten to lionized.

Seymour writes that “Rhys often said that she wrote about herself because that was all she knew,” and throughout the biography she demonstrates how Rhys’ characters were born of her experience, but also that they are born of Rhys’ imagination, and are not autobiographical clones. Rhys took what she knew, her Dominican childhood, her young adulthood as a chorus girl on tour, her bohemian life in Paris, her love affairs and marriages, and turned it into dark stories that publishers found too raw, unfit for a woman writer’s pen.

We met a woman who is damaged but determined, who bends to her weaknesses and shows incredible strength. Her beauty and charm lured men to want to possess her, then her violent temper dealt out blows. She walked away from an education to pursue the stage and yet wrote what the BBC identified as one of the ‘top 100 most influential novels.’

Her life was almost incomprehensibly complicated! If anyone truly lived, it was Rhys. Over her long life she went mad and discarded friends and men, hobnobbed with so many important people! Like so many Lost Generation writers she struggled with alcoholism, drug dependency and depression. She suffered accidents, underwent abortions, and was hospitalized for mental breakdown. No wonder she created unforgettable characters, women who contended with so much.

She was seventy-five years old when she published Wide Sargasso Sea in 1966. Rhys was ‘rediscovered’ by a new generation, finally found financial security, and unwelcomed fame. To the end of her life, she took care of her appearance, this petit blue-eyed, once blond-haired octogenarian, with her pink and white wigs and fashionable colorful clothes.

You won’t always like Jean Rhys. But you will be impressed by her resilience and determination.

Now, to read the rest of her work…

I received a free egalley from the publisher through NetGalley. My review is fair and unbiased.

A stunningly well-written and researched biography on the great writer Jean Rhys—and very sadly due to the fact that I can't find digital copies of Rhys' writings anywhere, my knowledge of her work is limited to her brilliantly original retelling of Jane Eyre from the point of view of the "mad woman in the attic" —Rochester's wife, "Bertha." With that book, I found it in a used bookstore and read it even though it was extremely difficult on my poor vision. ( I can't read paperbacks anymore due to an eye condition. I rely on digital so I can adjust the font.) Why aren't Jean's books in electronic form? It's a disgrace. But I digress...

Jean is an extremely complex woman who had a difficult life. She also had a natural ability. It's quite astonishing, given her lack of formal education, what a profound ability she had—but she also worked very hard at it, and had some extremely talented mentors.

So here is where I take off a star... the author doesn't seem to acknowledge that many times it appears as if what the author refers to as "love" relationships were really little more than Jean being forced to exchange sex for anything, whether it was a place to live, a job, a publishing deal, or even her literary agent! Many times I'd start to think "Okay, well, at least she didn't have to sleep with this one..." and then the author would blithely mention that Jean started a physical relationship with this one too. They could not have all been willingly reciprocal relationships given they always seemed to start when Jean either had no money or was desperately striving for a career, or both. I would have loved to have seen the author take on this topic a bit more.

That said, if you are a fan of Jean's writing, and I am definitely am, then you need to pick up this biography. And I hope her estate or publisher or whomever is controlling her copyrights will make her works available in digital form.

Thank you to NetGalley, the publisher, and Miranda Seymour for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I just reviewed I Used to Live Here Once by Miranda Seymour. #IUsedtoLiveHereOnce #NetGalley

A fascinating and intimate look at the author of the beloved WIDE SARGASSO SEA, Miranda Seymour's I USED TO LIVE HERE ONCE paints a rich portrait of a complex and fiercely talented writer, as well as the times in which she lived. Deeply researched and vivid, this is a finely crafted biography which reads as compellingly as a novel.

I Used to Live Here Once by Miranda Seymour is a fascinating biography about Jean Rhys, a writer who grew up in the Caribbean, and how her early life was woven into her stories.

I loved all the old pictures. The story was full of interesting facts, and it seems so much research went into writing this account of Jean Rhys's life. I enjoyed reading this book and getting to know Jean and the people she met along her journey in life.

#IUsedtoLiveHereOnce #NetGalley @wwnorton