Dora Russell Author

• Gender: Female
• Citizenship: United Kingdom
• Born: Apr 3, 1894
• Died: May 31, 1986

Dora Black, Lady Russell (3 April 1894 - 31 May 1986) was a British author, a feminist and socialist campaigner, and the second wife of the eminent philosopher Bertrand Russell.

Dora Black was born into an English upper-middle class family, the second of four children. Her father, Sir Frederick Black, worked his way up in the Civil Service and laid great store by his children's education, regardless of their sex. She went to a private co-educational primary school near her parents' home, won a junior scholarship to Sutton High School. In 1911 she spent nearly a year at a private boarding school for girls in Germany, in preparation for the 'Little Go' at Cambridge. There she won a modern languages scholarship to Girton College, Cambridge. Soon she joined the Heretics Society, co-founded by C. K. Ogden in 1909. It questioned traditional authorities in general and religious dogma in particular. The society helped her to discard traditional values and develop her own feminist mode of thought. In June 1915 she received a First Class Honours degree in modern languages at Girton with a special distinction in Orals.