Sarah Fuller Flower Adams
Sarah Fuller Flower Adams (1805-1848) was an English poet and playwright renowned for her contributions to literature and music, particularly in the context of religious hymnody. Born to Benjamin Flower, a political writer, and Eliza Gould Flower in Harlow, Essex, she displayed artistic talents from a young age, performing dramatic readings and singing classical music. After moving to London, she engaged with a circle of intellectuals and reformers, cultivating significant friendships with figures such as Robert Browning and Harriet Martineau.
Adams is perhaps best known for her hymn "Nearer My God to Thee," written at the age of twenty-one, and she composed a total of fourteen hymns, alongside translations of Spanish and Portuguese works. Her marriage to fellow writer William Brydges Adams supported her literary pursuits, but her health declined in the late 1830s, which ultimately led her to focus more on writing than acting. Despite her struggles with health, she produced notable works, including the five-act dramatic poem "Vivia Perpetua." After the death of her sister Eliza and her own deteriorating condition, Adams ceased writing, and she passed away from tuberculosis in 1848. Her legacy endures through her hymns, plays, and the impact she had on the literary and artistic communities of her time.
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Subject Terms
Sarah Fuller Flower Adams
Poet
- Born: February 22, 1805
- Birthplace: Harlow, Essex, England
- Died: August 14, 1848
- Place of death: St. Martin-in-the-Fields, Middlesex, England
Biography
Sarah Fuller Flower was born on February 22, 1805, in Harlow, Essex, England, to political writer and religious dissenter Benjamin Flower and liberalist Eliza Gould Flower. Her mother died when she was five, leaving her with a father who would influence her passions. However, her passion was not for politics, but for the stage. Early on, she would perform dramatic monologues; readings of Shakespeare in the family parlor; costumed acts designed by her sister, Eliza, including “Hallowmas Eve” and “Madge Wildfire’s Song” (by Sir Walter Scott); and she delighted her 1820’s audience with contralto renditions of classical and folk music, such as “The Cid” (John Ellerton) and “The Erl King” (Franz Schubert). Singing to her talented sister Eliza’s compositions, she would help set the musical standards at the Finsbury Unitarian South Place Chapel, where she and her sister led hymnals.
Moving with her father in 1820 to the London borough of Dalton, Sarah now exposed to intellectual, literary, and political reformist personalities explored what would become lifelong friendships with Robert Browning, William Linton, Harriet Martineau, James Stuart Mill, and Joshua E. Wills. The latter, Wills, six years her junior, later noted that despite Flower’s religious doubts and avowed atheism, she wrote religious hymns such as the one she is today best known for, “Nearer My God to Thee.” She wrote this hymn at only twenty-one years of age. She wrote thirteen others between 1826 and 1836, and also translated numerous Spanish and Portugese hymns. Religious influence continued, as did the furthering of her passions to perform, when Sarah’s father died in 1829, leaving her to live with her father’s pre-designated executor and guardian, the Reverend George J. Fox. The reverend’s son, William Fox, first nurtured and encouraged her manifold talents, then provided publishing and performing opportunities. William’s brother Charles published her work.
During the productive 1830’s, Sarah found more success. She married William Brydges Adams, an engineer and fellow writer also published frequently in Fox’s popular Monthly Repository. She had met Adams through Mrs. John Taylor (later Mrs. John Stuart Mill), and as he showed appreciation for Sarah Flower’s work, so did he support her endeavors after their marriage. Happily married and pursuing the literary life, Adams began serious acting in 1837 first as Shakespeare’s Lady Macbeth, then as Portia in the Merchant of Venice and Lady Teazle in Richard Sheridan’s School for Scandal. Though her acting skills were enough for an extended engagement at the Bath Theatre, Adams’s health began failing. Unable to keep to scheduling rigors, she returned to writing. This time, she wrote dramas: works that returned to early religious influences, such as those in her largest work, a five-act dramatic poem titled, Vivia Perpetua, published in 1841, and her last work, a catechism, The Flock at the Fountain, published in 1845. One month later, Sarah’s sister Eliza died, grieving her so that she ceased writing altogether. At the same time, her own health weakened dramatically, and she died from tuberculosis on August 14, 1848.