Caryll Houselander

Caryll Houselander (29 September 1901 – 12 October 1954) was an English lay Roman Catholic ecclesiastical artist, mystic, popular religious writer and poet.

Early life

Houselander was born in Bath; the second of two daughters of Wilmott and Gertrude Provis Houselander who were English Anglicans.

Several authors, including Maisie Ward in her 1962 biography Caryll Houselander: That Divine Eccentric, incorrectly state that Houselander was born on 29 October 1901 when, in fact, she was born on 29 September 1901 according to her birth certificate. In her remark in A Rocking-Horse Catholic (cited below, p. 41), she took the Confirmation name of Michael "after the Archangel on whose feast day I was born."

When Houselander was six, her mother converted to Roman Catholicism and she in turn was also baptised. Shortly after her ninth birthday, her parents separated and her mother opened a boarding house to support the family; Houselander was sent to a boarding school, the Convent of the Holy Child.

During the Second World War, doctors began sending patients to Houselander for counselling and therapy. Even though she lacked formal education in this area, she seemed to have a natural empathy for people in mental anguish and a talent for helping them to rebuild their world. A visitor once found her alone on the floor, apparently in great pain, which she attributed to her willingness to take on herself a great trial and temptation that was overwhelming another person. A psychiatrist, Eric Strauss, later president of the British Psychological Society, said of Houslander: "she loved them back to life... .she was a divine eccentric."

Houselander titled her autobiography A Rocking-Horse Catholic to differentiate herself from those termed "Cradle Catholics". She died in London of breast cancer on 12 October 1954, at the age of 53.