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John Edward Mercer (1857-1922) was born in Bradford, Yorkshire, the son of a minister. After studying at Lincoln College, Oxford, he was ordained by the Bishop of Durham in 1880 and nearly all his work in his early years was in poor, working-class parishes. He took great interest in social work, including work to improve living conditions in Manchester where he held incumbencies at Angel Meadow and Gorton. He was appointed Bishop of Tasmania i...

Maurice Hewlett (1861-1923) was an English historical novelist, poet and essayist. Born in Weybridge, he was educated at the London International College, Isleworth, and called to the bar in 1891 but gave up the law after the success of his historical novel The Forest Lovers published in 1898. From 1896-1901 he was Keeper of Lands, Revenues, Records and Enrolments, a government post as adviser on matters of medieval law. He married Hilda Beatr...

Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-64) was an American novelist and short story writer whose works often focus on history, morality and religion. He was born in Salem, Mass., and his ancestor John Hathorne was the only judge involved in the Salem witch trials who never repented of his actions. Hawthorne graduated from Bowdoin College in1825 and his first novel Fanshawe was published in 1828. Over the following years he had a number of stories published...

Kellogg Durland (1881-1911) was an American social worker and writer born in New York City. In 1901 he worked for four months as a coal miner in Scotland to study mining conditions at first-hand, publishing Among the Fife Miners in 1904. From 1904-05 he became an assistant at University Settlement, New York, and went on to give lectures on events and conditions in Russia after spending a year in that country gathering information. His book The...

James Fenimore Cooper (1789-1851) was an American writer of the first half of the 19th century whose historical romances depicting frontier and Native American life from the 17th-19th centuries created a unique form of American literature. He lived for much of his boyhood, and the last 15 years of his life, in Cooperstown, New York, which was founded by his father. He was enrolled at Yale University aged 13 but, following a series of pranks, w...

James Fenimore Cooper (1789-1851) was an American writer of the first half of the 19th century whose historical romances depicting frontier and Native American life from the 17th-19th centuries created a unique form of American literature. He lived for much of his boyhood, and the last 15 years of his life, in Cooperstown, New York, which was founded by his father. He was enrolled at Yale University aged 13 but, following a series of pranks, w...

Mary Hunter Austin (1868-1934) was one of the early nature writers of the American Southwest. Her classic The Land of Little Rain (1903) describes the flora, fauna and people, as well as evoking the mysticism and spirituality, of the region between the High Sierra and the Mojave Desert of southern California. She was born in Carlinville, Illinois, the fourth of six children, and graduated from Blackburn College in 1888. Her family moved to Cal...

Edward Alden Jewell (1888-1947) was an art critic for the New York Times for more than twenty years, contributing numerous pieces throughout the 1930s and 40s, and the author of books on art and artists and also several novels. These latter include The Charmed Circle, The White Kami, and The Moth Decides. The Moth Decides, first published in 1922, is a lightly comedic novel recounting the romantic adventures of Louise and her sister Hilda, dau...

Thomas Babington Macaulay (1800-59) was a British historian and Whig politician who wrote extensively as an essayist on contemporary and historical socio-political subjects, and as a reviewer, but who is best remembered for his The History of England. The first two volumes of this work appeared in 1848, with the third and fourth volumes published in 1855. At his death he was working on the fifth volume, bringing his history down to the death o...

Guizot (1787-1874) was a French historian, orator and statesman who was a dominant figure in French politics prior to the Revolution of 1848. A conservative liberal who opposed the attempt by Charles X to usurp legislative power, he worked to sustain a constitutional monarchy following the July Revolution of 1830. He then served the 'citizen king' Louis Philippe as Minister of Education from 1832-37, ambassador to London, Foreign Minister from...

William Clark Russell (1844-1911) was an English writer best known for his nautical novels. At the age of 13 he joined the Merchant Navy, serving for eight years. The hardships of life at sea damaged his health permanently but provided him with ample material for a career as a writer. He wrote short stories, press articles, historical essays, biographies, and a book of verse, but, above all, gained popularity for his novels, most of which were...

Romain Rolland (1866-1944) was a French dramatist, novelist, essayist, art historian and mystic who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1915. He was a leading supporter of Stalin in France and also noted for his correspondence with and influence on Sigmund Freud. Accepted into the Ecole normale superieure in 1886, he first studied philosophy but his independence of spirit led him to abandon that so as not to submit to the dominant id...

Gerald Cumberland was the pseudonym used by the British author, journalist, poet and composer Charles Frederick Kenyon (1876-1926). Kenyon was a librettist, essayist, and author of a few crime novels. He trained as a musician and was for some years the drama and music critic of the Daily Critic. In 1901, under his own name, he published a study of the work of the writer and playwright Hall Caine entitled Hall Caine, the Man and the Novelist, a...

Moliere was the stage name used by Jean-Baptiste Poquelin (1622-73), the French playwright, actor and poet, widely regarded as one of the greatest writers in the French language and universal literature. His works include comedies, farces, tragi-comedies, comedie-ballets, and more. His plays have been translated into every major language and are performed more often at the Comedie Francaise than those of any other playwright. After 13 years as...

Frances Burney (1752-1840), also known as Fanny Burney and later Madame d'Arblay, was an English satirical novelist, diarist and playwright. Her first novel, Evelina, was published anonymously in 1778 but once her identity as the author was discovered it brought her immediate fame as the work was widely admired for its unique narrative and comic strengths. Of her four novels it was her most successful and remains the best regarded. Her second ...

Charles Babbage (1791-1871) was an English polymath - a mathematician, philosopher, inventor and mechanical engineer who originated the idea of a digital programmable computer. He is credited with inventing the first mechanical computer that eventually led to more complex electronic designs, though all the essential ideas of modern computers are to be found in his Analytical Engine. His varied work in other fields has earned him the reputation...

Stephen Leacock (1869-1944) was a Canadian teacher, political scientist, writer, and humourist. Between 1915-25 he was the best-known English-speaking humourist in the world. Born near Southampton in southern England, his family emigrated to Canada when he was six where their attempts at farming proved unsuccessful and Leacock's father became an alcoholic, later deserting the family. Leacock attended Upper Canada College in Toronto where he wa...

Edmund Hodgson Yates (1831-94) was a British journalist, novelist and dramatist. He was born in Edinburgh and educated at Highgate School in London from 1840-46 before taking a position as clerk in the General Post Office. He then embarked on a career in journalism, working on the Court Journal and then the Daily News. His first book My Haunts and Their Frequenters was published in 1854, followed by a succession of novels and plays. As a contr...

Sigrid Undset (1882-1949) was a Norwegian novelist who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1928. She was born in Kalundborg, Denmark, but her family moved to Norway when she was two. She fled Norway for the US in 1940 because of her opposition to Nazi Germany and the German invasion and occupation of Norway, but returned after the end of WW2 in 1945. Her best-known work is Kristin Lavransdatter (1920-22), a trilogy about life in Norw...

Sheridan (1751-1816) was an Irish satirist, playwright, poet and longterm owner of the London Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. He was also a Whig MP for 32 years. His plays, including The Rivals, The School for Scandal and A Trip to Scarborough, are still regularly performed worldwide. Born in Dublin, his family moved to England in 1758 where he attended Harrow School and was later educated at home by a private tutor. In 1772, aged 21, he eloped wit...