The Invention of Empathy

Museum Secrets

13-01-2021 • 7 mins

Podcast host Lucie Dawkins takes a look at John Singer Sargent’s drawing of Vernon Lee in the Ashmolean Collection. Vernon was a genderqueer trailblazer who invented the word ‘empathy’ in the English language.

Portrait of Vernon Lee – View it here

If you want to take a closer look at John Singer Sargent’s drawing of Vernon Lee, you can view it at the link above, or visit the podcast page on the Ashmolean website: ashmolean.org/museum-secrets

Producer and Presenter: Lucie Dawkins

About Museum Secrets: The curators at the University of Oxford's Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology have been recording bite-sized tales of the wonderful, and sometimes unexpected, life of a museum. We can’t wait to share them with you! Join us every weekday for 3 weeks, from 28 December onwards, for a daily dose of cheer.