Dora Sigerson Shorter

Dora Maria Sigerson Shorter (16 August 1866 – 6 January 1918)^[1] was an Irish poet and sculptor, who after her marriage in 1895 wrote under the name Dora Sigerson Shorter.

Dora Sigerson Shorter
Born	(1866-08-16)16 August 1866 Dublin, Ireland
Died	6 January 1918(1918-01-06) (aged 51)
Pen name	Dora Sigerson Shorter
Occupation	Poet sculptor
Nationality	Irish
Spouse	Clement Shorter ​ (m. 1895)​
Parents	George Sigerson Hester Varian

Life

She was born in Dublin, Ireland, the daughter of George Sigerson, a surgeon and writer, and Hester Varian, also a writer. She was the oldest of four children.^[2] The family home at 3 Clare Street was a gathering-place for artists and writers where Dora met important figures of the emerging Irish literary revival. She attended the Dublin School of Art, where W.B. Yeats was a fellow-pupil.^[3] She was a major figure of the Irish Literary Revival, publishing many collections of poetry from 1893. Her sister Hester Sigerson Piatt was also a writer. Her friends included Katharine Tynan, Rose Kavanagh and Alice Furlong, writers and poets.^[4]

In 1895 she married Clement King Shorter, an English journalist and literary critic. They lived together in London, until her death at age 51 from undisclosed causes.^[5] Her friend Katharine Tynan wrote in a biographical sketch that she supposedly ‘died of a broken heart’ after the 1916 executions.^[6]

Selected publications

• The Fairy Changeling and Other Poems London & New York: John Lane 1897.
• The Father Confessor, Stories of Death and Danger London: Ward Lock & Co 1900.
• The Story and Song of Black Roderick London: Alexander Moring 1906.
• The Collected Poems of Dora Sigerson Shorter; with an introduction by George Meredith. London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1907.
• New Poems. Dublin & London: Maunsel, 1912 (3rd ed., 1921).
• Madge Linsey, and other poems. Dublin & London: Maunsel, 1913.