A Life Before: The Serial. Find Your Way with The Chapter Log
The complete guide, with links, to every published episode of A Life Before: The Serial.
Discover the secret childhood wounds that drew Maud Gonne and W.B. Yeats together into a political pairing and mystical marriage that made legends of them both.
FULL LOG WITH LINKS BELOW
Before Maud Gonne or W.B. Yeats's became icons of Irish literature, politics, history, and metaphysics, they were two young and unfinished young people. A Life Before tells the story of those early years. This dual coming-of-age story, drawn from real lives, real letters, and real history, is being told here on Substack the old way—in instalments.
Follow the budding revolutionary as she is drawn into a love affair and political cause in France—both more dangerous than she knows—and the dreaming poet, yearning for greatness. Narrated by Rosy Cross ‘the oldest woman in Ireland’ who has her own reasons for following the pair through two separate worlds that will soon collide, each episode is a complete short story you can enjoy on its own.
Read in order, the stories gather and deepen across five acts into a full novel.
Your options:
New here? Begin at the beginning with 1:1 — A Strange House of Time, and read on.
If you’re already following, find your place in the index below. Jump back in with this linked guide to every episode published to date.
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Act One
1:1. A Strange House of Time In which our narrator Rosy Cross introduces herself and her trade, and takes us to the French spa town of Royat, where Maud Gonne lies awake before dawn, sobbing over a man.
1:2. Drowning Herself for Pleasure In which Rosy Cross takes us back to the first meeting between Maud Gonne and the elegant Boulangist politician Lucien Millevoye.
1:3. Amber Scorched with Honey In which Maud and Millevoye’s courtship deepens through politics, poetry, and sightseeing drives—until Great-Aunt Mary drops a cannonball on the drawing-room rug.
1:4. The Small Business of Truth In which we learn how Maud Gonne’s stage career to date has been a disaster but she is now more concerned with getting an explanation from Millevoye.
1:5. That Note of Soft Command In which Millevoye confesses all and asks Maud Gonne to become his mistress and his political accomplice.
Counterpoint: Ten Conversations with W.B. Yeats.
Be Foolish With Me: The first conversation with W.B. Yeats: In which Rosy takes us across the Irish Sea to Dublin, to meet the young poet and dreamer as he learns that his father is moving the family back to London.
1:7. Being Who She Was In which Maud Gonne weighs a conventional life against the one Millevoye is offering — and, high on the slopes of the Puy de Dôme, makes her choice.
1:8. We Women Must Be Beautiful in which General Boulanger arrives to Royat to consider Maud Gonne’s suitability for the cause
1:9. A Life of Your Own in which Maud Gonne makes an unusual offer and makes her old nurse cry.
1:10. This is How to Live: In which Maud Gonne meets General Boulanger and is pulled into the political intrigue of his circle
1:11. A Man in Waiting: In which Maud Gonne and Lucien Millevoye spend a day together in Marseilles and he gives her an unusual gift to take to Constantinople
1:12. No Ladies May Land: In which Maud Gonne must use the revolver Millevoye gave her.
1:13. All the Men of the World: In which Maud Gonne’s body begins to declare itself..
Counterpoint: Ten Conversations with W.B. Yeats.
The Second Conversation with W.B. Yeats: In which the Brahmin, Mohoni Chaterjee, passes the secret of eternal happiness to the young poet.
Act Two
2:1. Our Friend in the East: In which Maud Gonne receives old and new proposals.
2.2. To St Petersburg: In which Maud Gonne is set to work on her first assignment for the Boulangists.
2:3. So Courteous a Gentleman: In which Maud Gonne outwits a Russian diplomat and is surprised by what he brings to her.
2:4. Peacefully if Possible: In which Maud Gonne declares herself a Republican and settles where and how she intends to live.
2:5. France Does Not Beg: In which Maud Gonne finds Millevoye is not all she had built him up to be.
2:6. Word by Cold Word: In which another man declares undying love for Maud Gonne and she wonders: is anyone who they seem to be?
2:7. Tune in next Friday for Episode 2:7.
in which Stead gives Maud Gonne an entrée to Ireland | Coming soon
