Katherine Bradley was born on 27 October 1846 in
Birmingham, England, the daughter of Charles Bradley, a tobacco manufacturer, and Emma (née Harris). Her grandfather, also Charles Bradley, was a prominent follower and financial backer of prophetess
Joanna Southcott and her self-styled successor
John "Zion" Ward. She attended lectures at the
Collège de France in 1868, and in 1874 she attended a course at
Newnham College, Cambridge specially designed for women; however, she did not receive a degree for it. Bradley's elder sister, Emma, married James Robert Cooper in 1860 and went to live in
Kenilworth, where their daughter, Edith Emma Cooper, was born on 12 January 1862. Emma Cooper became an invalid for life after the birth of her second daughter, Amy, and Katharine Bradley, being her sister, stepped in to become the legal guardian of her niece Edith Cooper. Bradley was for a time involved with
Ruskin's utopian project. She published first under the pseudonym
Arran Leigh, a nod to
Elizabeth Barrett. Cooper adopted the name
Isla Leigh for their first joint publication,
Bellerophôn. In the late 1870s, when Cooper was at
University College, Bristol, they agreed to live together and were, over the next 40 years,
lesbian lovers and co-authors. Their first joint publication as Michael Field was "Callirhöe and Fair Rosamund" in 1884. '
The Athenaeum noted that 'the famous Faun song in 'Callirrhoé,' which has found its way into many anthologies, the Fairy songs in 'Fair Rosamund,' and the whole of the poignant drama of 'The Father's Tragedy' were the work of the younger writer while still a girl.' Bradley and Cooper were
Aestheticists, strongly influenced by the thoughts of
Walter Pater. They developed a large circle of literary friends and contacts; in particular, painters and life partners
Charles Ricketts and
Charles Shannon, near whom they settled in
Richmond, London. Robert Browning was a close friend of theirs — if also the source of their leaked identity — as well as
Rudyard Kipling. They also knew and admired
Oscar Wilde, whose death they bitterly mourned. While Bradley and Cooper were always well connected and financially independent, their early critical success was not sustained. (This is often attributed to the joint identity of Field becoming known). They knew many of the
aesthetic movement of the 1890s, including
Walter Pater,
Vernon Lee,
J. A. Symonds and also
Bernard Berenson.
William Rothenstein was a friend. In 1899, the death of Cooper's father enabled them to buy their own house as evidence of their "close marriage" although Cooper saw her father's death as retribution for their lifestyle. She later led the way in establishing the couple as active Catholics. Bradley died on 26 September 1914, having moved to a cottage near McNabb at
Hawkesyard Priory,
Rugeley. They are buried together in the cemetery of St Mary Magdalen Roman Catholic Church in Mortlake. Bradley left most of her property to Charles Ricketts with a bequest of letters to the poet Frederick Gurney Salter and jewels and manuscripts to the University of Cambridge. ==Legacy==