[3] Her father was Eduard Swarth, a merchant and banker who for a while was the consul for Portugal in Amsterdam, and her mother was Maria Jacoba Heijblom.

[3] An early admirer was poet Willem Kloos who called her "the singing heart of Holland" and published her poems in his magazine De Nieuwe Gids.

[3] After two collections in French, Swarth published a Dutch volume of songs and sonnets, Eenzame bloemen ("Lonely flowers", 1883).

A reviewer in De Gids thought the songs frequently too sentimental (and in the vein of Heinrich Heine), but appreciated the sonnets.

[10] An overview article in Vlaamsche School (1889) pointed at the influence of Pol de Mont, who had advised her to forgo reading narrative and epic, and instead focus on lyrical poetry, sonnets.

According to Jacob Ek Jzn, this particular cause of sorrow speaks in all her work, without becoming a distraction or a bore since she found many different ways and forms of expressing both the initial sentiment and its recollection.