Carolyn Cummings-Osmond

About Carolyn

Carolyn Cummings-Osmond is an independent scholar, writer and former award-winning Senior Lecturer in English Literature with 24 years’ lecturing experience.

She also belongs to the British Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies (BSECS), the Women’s History Network and Biographers International Organization (BIO).

Carolyn is an avid reader of biography, fiction (including historical fiction) and memoir. Some of her favourites are The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Brontë, Silas Marner by George Eliot, Plum Bun by Jessie Redmon Fauset, Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter by Simon de Beauvoir, The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison, The Five by Hallie Rubenhold, The Case of the Married Woman: Caroline Norton by Antonia Fraser and In Cold Blood by Truman Capote.

MY WORK

the widow historian

Luxembourg Gardens, Paris

About

Origin of a Widow historian

Carolyn was widowed in a tragic set of circumstances many years ago and has used her experiences as a young, widowed mother to research and write about representations of widows in literature, film, advertising, visual art and media. She has given papers about widows at St. Hugh’s College, University of Oxford and the universities of Warwick, Aberdeen, Wales (Cardiff), Southampton and Solent. She is particularly interested in stories about widows whose husbands have died in unusual or suspicious circumstances. At the moment Carolyn is writing about the three women who became widowed during the long weekend of November 22, 1963.

Her book, Three Widows in Three Days: The remarkable lives of Jackie Kennedy, Marie Tippit and Marina Oswald will be available to mark the 60^th anniversary of the assassination of John F. Kennedy. She is also working on books about the widows of rock stars, famous writers, civil rights leaders. All of these women have been carefully scrutinised by the media and others.

Look out for Rock Chick Widows (Courtney Love and Yoko Ono), Literary Widows (Valerie Eliot, Georgie Yeats and Norris Mailer), Civil Rights Widows (Myrlie Evers, Coretta Scott King and Betty Shabazz)

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A Note from Carolyn

All women influence my stories, but I’m the most interested in widows. I welcome your comments and love to hear what you think of my work. It’s true that I’m a qualified telephone bereavement support worker but my site is not intended to function as a self-help site. For help and support with bereavement issues, please search online for bereavement support groups. And look after yourself.

Best,

Carolyn Cummings-Osmond

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Helpful Resources

SOBS: Survivors of Bereavement by Suicide

Cruse Bereavement Support

National Bereavement Service

Winston’s Wish (for children)