Constance Markievicz

Book excerpt: A biography of Countess Constance Georgina (Gore-Booth) Markievicz (1863-1927). She was a child of Henry Gore-Booth, heir to the baronetcy of Lissadell, County Sligo, and of his wife, Georgina Hill of Tickhill Castle in Yorkshire, whose grandfather was Lord Scarborough. Shortly after her birth, Constance was brought to Lissadell Court in County Sligo. She went to Paris to study art, and in 1901 married a Polish widower, Count Casimir Dunin Markievicz. They moved to Dublin in 1903, where she became a committed socialist and (in spite of being born an Anglo-Irish) an increasingly fervent Irish nationalist. "She was one of the first women to face many of the problems associated with nationalist struggles and feminism which are still hotly debated today. Constance Markiewicz was also the first woman to be elected to the British Parliament and the first woman to become a Minister of State in any European government"--Back lining paper.