Edith Nesbit

Edith Nesbit (London, 1858 - Kent, 1924) was an English writer and poet who signed her children's books as E. Nesbit. She lived through the Victorian and Edwardian eras and wrote in English. Today she is remembered above all as one of the creators of modern children's literature.

As a child she travelled for years through France, Spain and Germany, because her sister Mary's health was poor. In 1880 she married Hubert Bland, with whom she had three children, and later adopted the two children he had with Alice Hoatson. Her first published works were poems, and in March 1878 Good Words printed one of them. Alongside Bland she helped found the Fabian Society, although her marriage was turbulent and her political work mattered less to her than her writing career.

Her style mixed humour, realism and a serious respect for children. In many of her stories, ordinary children in contemporary England come across magical objects or travel to fantastic worlds, something that would now be called contemporary fantasy. The Bastables, a middle-class family in difficulties, appear in The Story of the Treasure Seekers and its sequels. She also wrote verse, plays and horror stories for adults.

Her legacy is considerable. C. S. Lewis, J. K. Rowling, P. L. Travers and Diana Wynne Jones all acknowledged her influence, direct or indirect, on their own work. She died in 1924 in Kent, probably of lung cancer.