Mathilda Roos

Mathilda Roos
Mathilda Roos
Born	(1852-08-02)2 August 1852 Stockholm, Sweden
Died	17 July 1908(1908-07-17) (aged 55) Danderyd, Sweden
Occupation	writer

Lovisa Mathilda Roos (2 August 1852 – 17 July 1908), also known under the pen name M. Rs., was a Swedish writer.¹

Lovisa Mathilda Roos was born 2 August 1852 in Stockholm. Her parents were Malte Leopold Roos (1806–1882), a colonel at Svea Artillery Regiment, and Mathilda (Tilda) Beata Meurk (born 1821). She was educated at home and at Åhlinska skolan. Remaining unmarried, she lived with his sister Anna and sometimes also with Laura Fitinghoff, with whom she built the Furuliden house in Stocksund, which later became, as she had hoped, a rest home for women.²

Roos was a member of the women's association Nya Idun and one of its first committee members.³²

Roos' novels usually dealt with women's issues and their unfair treatment in society. She was not afraid to address sensitive subjects at that time including lesbian love in Den första kärleken (The First Love). A religious crisis in the 1880s affected her later books. In the novel Hvit ljung (White Heather), she takes up the unclear living conditions of a teacher and rape. This is considered to have contributed to a government decision that greatly improved teachers' salaries. In women's political pamphlets, she addressed Ellen Key's ideas, Ett ord till fröken Ellen Key och till den svenska kvinnan (A word to Miss Ellen Key and to the Swedish woman), 1896. Roos died 17 July 1908, in Danderyd.

Fiction

For children and young readers

• Mathilda Roos at Svenskt kvinnobiografiskt lexikon