Dolly: A Voice from the Asylum

Wood, Lorraine

Abstract

During my initial visit to the abandoned building of Lancaster Moor Asylum, I stood peering
through the padlocked railings steadying my hands to take photographs that captured a lost
world. Further research led me to the black-and-white photograph of Dolly Mabel Mountain,
which initially inspired this thesis. It was taken by Ian Beesley: a photographer appointed
Artist in Residence in the early 1990s. During a phototherapy session he met Dolly, just
before her Hundredth birthday. Dolly gave birth to an illegitimate child in 1910, when she
was sixteen, and thereafter spent eighty-four-years in Lancaster Moor Asylum.
Later in 2012, I conducted a telephone interview to discuss Ian's meeting with Dolly. His
words resonated with me as I imagined: Dolly still rocking in her chair grieving for her baby
until she died. A strong empathic response towards her situation compels me to tell Dolly’s
story, a story that needs to be heard. Empathy is the thread that runs throughout each section
and is central to this exploration, as I reach back through time to illuminate a hidden life via
creative practices, including poetry, photographic images, and art.
In this thesis, I (re)create Dolly’s story and present it as a collection of eighty-four poems,
one for each year of Dolly’s life in the asylum, titled: Dolly: An Innocent Voice. These
creative texts function as constructions of her life exploring authenticity through her recreated
voice. The facts are springboards to the imaginative work.
Research has revealed that many women, like Dolly, were forced to give up their babies.
A critical exploration reveals the experiences of women in asylums, as I engage with the
work of related writers/artists. Creative research methods include poetic devices and the use
of fieldwork to enrich empathy.
I also include auto/biographical insights from living with my mother’s Vascular Dementia
and the connections I found with Dolly. Poetry will appear in italics throughout this thesis as
a link between creative and critical practice.

Citation

Wood, L. (2024). Dolly: A Voice from the Asylum. (Thesis)

• Thesis Type: Thesis
• Deposit Date: May 24, 2024
• Publicly Available Date: Jul 1, 2024
• Award Date: May 31, 2024