[PW] Re: Mr. ?

[Sylvia Milne]

Don't forget that before the twentieth century people were far more formal.
If you read nineteenth century novels, you will see that it is quite common 
for husbands and wives to address one another as Mr. and Mrs.
For example in "The last chronicle of Barset", Mrs. Proudie always calls her 
husband "Bishop" or "My Lord".
I think that she only once calls him "Tom"  when she is pleading with him 
just before her death.
Archdeacon and Mrs. Grantly have a much happier marriage but Mrs. Grantly 
often calls her husband "Archdeacon".
Certainly it was the custom to talk about one's spouse to third parties as 
Mr. or Mrs.
In the same novel, it is a sign that Mr. Toogood is not quite a gentleman 
that he refers to his wife as "Maria" in a letter to Mr. Crawley.
The point of my waffle is that it's very likely that more than one author's 
wife might well have addressed her husband as "Mr."

Sylvia Milne

Please visit me at
http://www.sylviamilne.co.uk
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Staci Priest" <purple_roses3 at yahoo.com>
To: <list at project-wombat.org>
Sent: Friday, December 01, 2006 8:07 PM
Subject: [PW] Mr. ?


> No rush as this is just for me.
>
> When I was in high school, my wonderful English teacher introduced us to 
> the private life of one of our authors.  It was noted that his wife never 
> called him by his first name, but only Mr. and his last name.  Does anyone 
> know which author this was?  I'm fairly certain he was European as it was 
> my senior year and we handled American literature in the Junior year.
>
> Sincerely,
> Staci
>