Clarissa Dickson-Wright Clarissa Dickson-Wright

Clarissa Theresa Philomena Aileen Mary Josephine Agnes Elsie Trilby Louise Esmerelda Dickson Wright was an English celebrity chef, television personality, writer, businesswoman, and former barrister. Dickson Wright was born in St John's Wood, London,[3] the youngest of four children. [4][5] Her father, Arthur Dickson Wright, was a surgeon to the Royal Family, and her mother, Aileen Mary (Molly) Bath,[3] was an Australian heiress.[2] She said her father was an alcoholic who subjected his wife and children to verbal and physical abuse.[6] At the age of 11, Wright was sent to The Convent of the Sacred Heart, a former independent school for girls in the coastal town of Hove in Sussex, and then to the Convent of the Sacred Heart at Woldingham, now known as Woldingham School. (The Hove school closed in 1966.) After school, Wright studied for the Bar at Gray's Inn, while pursuing a law degree at University College London.[7] At the age of 21, Dickson Wright passed her Bar exams and became England's youngest barrister.[2] After her mother died of a heart attack in 1975, she inherited ￡2.8 million. Her mother's death, combined a few years later with her father's, left her in a deep depression, and she drank heavily for the following 12 years.[7] In 1979, Dickson Wright took control of the food at a drinking club in St James's Place in London. While there she met Clive ("no surname, because he has children" according to Dickson Wright), a fellow alcoholic, and they had a relationship until his death in 1982 from kidney failure at the age of 40.[2] Shortly thereafter she was disbarred for practising without chambers.[8] Dickson Wright claimed that, during