Lady Anne Blunt Biography by HVF Winstone

Lady Anne Blunt

A Biography

by

HVF Winstone

Lady Anne Blunt , granddaughter of Lord Byron, was the first Western women to make a recorded journey into Central Arabia,traveling with her husband through the Nafud Desert to the Nejd. The crowning achievment of her life was the rescue of the Arab horse from effective extinction and she is regarded by many equine authorities as the saviour of the true purebred Arabian horse. She set up the famous Crabbet Arabian Stud in England, Sheykh Obeyd Stud in Egypt, and translated the verse of some of the timeless pre-Islamic Arabian writers.

This is the first and only biography of Lady Anne Blunt and the author draws extensively from her unpublished letters and diaries, in which she tells of her struggles, heartbreak, travels, her daughter Judith, later known as Lady Wentworth. She suffered in dignified silence as her husband , the poet Wilfred Scawen Blunt,threw himself headlong into a succession of scandalous affairs. Lady Anne suffered the torments of a women scorned, and the agonies of a wife whos hopes of producing a male heir were repeatedly dashed. She transforms her private pain into a tireless quest to save the Arab horse. This book shares her experiences buying horses from the Beduion tribes, her association with breeders of Arabian horses in Europe and America.

This is a poignant and illuminating portrait of a talented, determined and visionary woman.

Hard cover book with DJ, New, illustrated with photos and color examples of Lady Annes beautiful watercolors. 380 pages, copyright 2003