Editing Marie Corelli (section)

===Personal life===
[[File:Mason Croft - DPLA - 60e122bf26e18fe19b8c07b52fed8ef7.jpg|thumb|Corelli lived and died in Stratford-upon-Avon, 1901{{ndash}}1924. Her house, "Mason Croft", is now the home of the [[Shakespeare Institute]].<br>Mason Croft in 1913.<br>]]

Corelli spent her final years in [[Stratford-upon-Avon]]. There she fought hard for the preservation of Stratford's 17th-century buildings, and donated money to help their owners remove the plaster or brickwork that often covered their original [[Timber framing|timber-framed]] façades.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=990DEEDF173AE733A2575BC2A9609C946297D6CF|title=CARNEGIE AND CORELLI.; Sidney Lee Publishes a Letter Whioh Throws Light on the Stratford-on-Avon Library Fuss |work=[[The New York Times]]|date= June 28, 1903}}</ref> Novelist [[Barbara Comyns Carr]] mentions Corelli's guest appearance at an exhibition of Anglo-Saxon items found at [[Bidford-on-Avon]] in 1923.<ref>Comyns Carr (1985), p. 124.</ref> Corelli's eccentricity became well known. She would boat on the [[River Avon, Warwickshire|Avon]] in a [[gondola]], complete with a [[gondolier]], whom she had brought over from [[Venice]].<ref>[http://www.veniceboats.com/gondola-corelli-stratford.htm Venice Boats].</ref> In [[Mark Twain's Autobiography|his autobiography]], [[Mark Twain]], who had a deep dislike of Corelli, describes visiting her in Stratford and how the meeting changed his perception.

[[File:Bertha Vyver.jpg|thumb|left|upright|Bertha Vyver]]
For over forty years, Corelli lived with her companion, [[Bertha Vyver]],<ref>Frederico, pp. 162–86.</ref> to whom she left everything when she died. She did not identify herself as a [[lesbian]], but several biographers and critics have noted the frequent erotic descriptions of [[female beauty]] that appear in her novels, although they are expressed by men.<ref>Felski, pp. 130–31.</ref><ref>Frederico, p. 116.</ref><ref>Masters, p. 277.</ref>

Corelli was known to have expressed a genuine passion for the artist Arthur Severn, to whom she wrote daily letters from 1906 to 1917. Severn was the son of [[Joseph Severn]] and close friend of [[John Ruskin]]. In 1910, she and Severn collaborated on ''The Devil's Motor'', with Severn providing illustrations for Corelli's story. Her love for the long-married painter, her only known romantic attachment to a man, remained unrequited; in fact Severn often belittled Corelli's success.<ref>MacLeod, p. 21.</ref><ref>Frederico, p. 144.</ref><ref>Julia Kuehn, [http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/corelli/kuehn7.html "Marie Corelli's Love Letters to Arthur Severn"].</ref>

During the [[World War I|First World War]], Corelli's personal reputation suffered when she was convicted of [[Rationing in the United Kingdom#First World War 1914–1918|food hoarding]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p01npqws/features/makingtheseries|title=BBC One – Britain's Great War|publisher=BBC|date=10 February 2014}}.</ref>

[[File:Evesham Road cemetery.jpg|thumb|Marie Corelli died in Stratford and is buried there in the Evesham Road cemetery.]]

She died in Stratford and is buried there in the Evesham Road cemetery.<ref>Wilson, Scott. ''Resting Places: The Burial Sites of more than 14,000 Famous Persons'', 3rd ed.: 2 (Kindle Location 9851). McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers. Kindle Edition.</ref> Later Bertha Vyver was buried alongside her.