Edith Nesbit (married nameEdith Bland; 15 August 1858 – 4 May 1924) was an English writer and poet, who published herbooks for children and others asE. Nesbit. She wrote or collaborated on more than 60 such books. She was also a political activist and co-founder of theFabian Society, asocialist organisation later affiliated to theLabour Party.
Nesbit was born in 1858 at 38 Lower Kennington Lane,Kennington, Surrey (now classified asInner London),[a] the daughter of an agricultural chemist,John Collis Nesbit, who died in March 1862, before her fourth birthday. Her mother was Sarah Green (née Alderton).[2]
After Mary's death, Edith and her mother settled for three years at Halstead Hall,Halstead, north-westKent, a location that inspiredThe Railway Children, although the distinction has also been claimed by theDerbyshire town ofNew Mills.[4]
When Nesbit was 17, the family moved back toLewisham in south-east London. There is aLewisham Council plaque to her at 28 Elswick Road.[5]
In 1877, at the age of 18, Nesbit met the bank clerkHubert Bland, her elder by three years. Seven months pregnant, she married Bland on 22 April 1880, but did not initially live with him, as Bland remained with his mother. Their marriage was tumultuous. Early on, Nesbit found that another woman, Maggie Doran, who lived with his mother, believed she was Hubert's fiancée and had also borne him a child. Nesbit's children by Bland were Paul Cyril Bland (1880–1940), to whomThe Railway Children was dedicated, Mary Iris Bland (1881–1965), who married John Austin D Phillips in 1907,[6] and Fabian Bland (1885–1900).
A more serious blow came in 1886, when she discovered that her friendAlice Hoatson was pregnant by him. She had previously agreed to adopt Hoatson's child and allow Hoatson to live with her as their housekeeper. After she discovered the truth, she and her husband quarrelled violently and she suggested that Hoatson and the baby,Rosamund, should leave; her husband threatened to leave Edith if she disowned the baby and its mother. Hoatson remained with them as a housekeeper and secretary and became pregnant by Bland again 13 years later. Edith again adopted Hoatson's child, John.[7] Bland's two children by Alice Hoatson, whom Edith adopted, wereRosamund Edith Nesbit Hamilton, later Bland (1886–1950), who married Clifford Dyer Sharp on 16 October 1909,[8] and to whomThe Book of Dragons was dedicated, and John Oliver Wentworth Bland (1899–1946) to whomThe House of Arden andFive Children and It were dedicated.[9][10] Nesbit's son Fabian died aged 15 after atonsil operation; Nesbit dedicated several books to him, includingThe Story of the Treasure Seekers and its sequels. Nesbit's adopted daughter Rosamund collaborated with her onCat Tales.
E. Nesbit's grave in St Mary in the Marsh's churchyard bears a wooden marker by her second husband, Thomas Terry Tucker. There is also a memorial plaque to her inside the church.
Nesbit admired the artist andMarxian socialistWilliam Morris.[11][12] The couple joined the founders of theFabian Society in 1884,[13] after which their son Fabian was named,[14] and jointly edited its journalToday. Hoatson was its assistant secretary. Nesbit and Bland dallied with theSocial Democratic Federation, but found it too radical. Nesbit was a prolific lecturer and writer on socialism in the 1880s. She and her husband co-wrote under the pseudonym "Fabian Bland",[15] However, the joint work dwindled as her success rose as a children's author. She was a guest speaker at theLondon School of Economics, which had been founded by other Fabian Society members.
Edith lived from 1899 to 1920 atWell Hall,Eltham, in south-east London,[16] which makes fictional appearances in several of her books, such asThe Red House. From 1911 she kept a second home on the Sussex Downs at Crowlink,Friston, East Sussex.[17] She and her husband entertained many friends, colleagues and admirers at Well Hall.[18]
On 20 February 1917, some three years after Bland died, Nesbit married Thomas "the Skipper" Tucker inWoolwich, where he was captain of theWoolwich Ferry.
Although she was the family breadwinner and has the father inThe Railway Children declare that "[g]irls are just as clever as boys, and don’t you forget it!", Nesbit did not champion women's rights. "She opposed the cause of women’s suffrage—mainly, she claimed, because women could swing Tory, thus harming the Socialist cause."[19] She is said to have avoided the literary moralising that characterised the age. "And, most crucially, both books are constructed from a blueprint that is also a kind of reënactment of the author’s own childhood: an idyll torn up at its roots by the exigencies of illness, loss, and grief."[19]
Towards the end of her life, Nesbit moved first to Crowlink, then with the Skipper to two conjoined properties which wereRoyal Flying Corps buildings, 'Jolly Boat' and 'Long Boat'. Nesbit lived in 'Jolly Boat' and the Skipper in 'Long Boat'. Nesbit died in 'The Long Boat' at Jesson,St Mary's Bay,New Romney, Kent, in 1924, probably from lung cancer (she "smoked incessantly"),[20] and was buried in the churchyard ofSt Mary in the Marsh. Her husband Thomas died at the same address on 17 May 1935. Edith's son Paul Bland was an executor of Thomas Tucker's will.
Nesbit's first published works were poems. She was under 20 in March 1878, when the monthly magazineGood Words printed her poem "Under the Trees".[21] In all she published about 40 books for children, including novels, storybooks and picture books.[22] Works ofWilliam Shakespeare adapted by her for childrenhave been translated.[23] She also published almost as many books jointly with others.
In 2011, Nesbit was accused of taking the plot ofThe Railway Children fromThe House by the Railway byAda J. Graves.The Telegraph reported that the Graves book had appeared in 1896, nine years prior toThe Railway Children, and listed similarities between them.[24] However, not all sources agree on this finding:[25] Online magazineTor.com noted that both books had been released in 1906.[26]
Nesbit's biographer Julia Briggs names her "the first modern writer for children", who "helped to reverse the great tradition of children's literature inaugurated byLewis Carroll,George MacDonald andKenneth Grahame, in turning away from theirsecondary worlds to the tough truths to be won from encounters with things-as-they-are, previously the province of adult novels".[27] Briggs also credits Nesbit with inventing the children'sadventure story.[28]Noël Coward was an admirer. In a letter to an early biographer,Noel Streatfeild wrote, "She had an economy of phrase and an unparalleled talent for evoking hot summer days in the English countryside."[29]
Edith Nesbit Walk and cycleway runs along the south side of Well Hall Pleasaunce in Eltham.[34]
Lee Green, also in south-east London, has Edith Nesbit Gardens.[35]
A 200-metre footpath inGrove Park south-east London, between Baring Road and Reigate Road, is named Railway Children Walk after the novel,[36] as is one inOxenhope, a film location on theKeighley and Worth Valley Railway used in the 1970 film.[37]
There is a Nesbit Road in St Mary's Bay, Romney Marsh, where Nesbit's home Long Boat & Jolly Boat stands.[38]
Nesbit House, a care home atBadgers Mount,Kent, is located near Halstead Hall where Edith Nesbit lived when she was young.[39]
Nesbit's life inspired a one-act, one-woman play,Larks and Magic, by Alison Neil, in 2018.[44][45][46]
Several of Nesbit's horror short stories were adapted into the anthology playThe Shadow in the Dark by Oliver Giggins and Ash Pryce, which also drew on elements of Nesbit's own life and fears taken from her autobiographical writings. The show premiered at the Edinburgh Horror Festival in 2023.[47]
American children's book authorEdward Eager considered Nesbit the best children's author of all time; his books have been compared to Nesbit's and his characters are often fans of her work.[48]
Woman of Stone, the Christmas Eve 2024 episode of theBBC's 'A Ghost Story for Christmas' strand, is an adaptation of Nesbit's horror storyMan-Size in Marble. The film, written and directed byMark Gatiss, featuresCelia Imrie as Nesbit.
Aside from an episode of the BBC's 'A Ghost Story for Christmas' from her autobiographicalLong Ago When I was Young (published 1966), Nesbit has been the subject of five biographies.
The Complete History of the Bastable Family (1928) is a posthumous omnibus of the three Bastable novels, but does not include the four stories appearing in the 1905 collectionOswald Bastable and Others.[1] The Bastables also feature in the 1902 adult novelThe Red House.
1925Five of Us—and Madeline (posthumously assembled and edited by Rosamund E. Nesbit Bland, containing the title novel and two short stories perhaps completed by Nesbit)[54]
"The Ebony Frame", "John Charrington's Wedding", "Uncle Abraham's Romance", "The Mystery of the Semi-Detached", "From the Dead", "Man-Size in Marble", "The Mass for the Dead"
Something Wrong (horror stories), 1893
In Homespun (10 stories "written in an English dialect" of South Kent and Sussex), 1896
The Literary Sense (18 stories), 1903
Man and Maid (10 stories), 1906 (some supernatural stories)[c]
Fear (horror stories), 1910
Collected Supernatural Stories, 2000
"Dormant" ("Rose Royal"), "Man-size in Marble", "The Detective", "No. 17", "John Charrington's Wedding", "The Blue Rose", "The Haunted House", "The House With No Address" ("Salome and the Head"), "The Haunted Inheritance", "The House of Silence", "The Letter in Brown Ink", "The Shadow", "The New Samson", "The Pavilion"
From the Dead: The Complete Weird Stories of E Nesbit, 2005
"Introduction" (by S. T. Joshi), "John Charrington's Wedding", "The Ebony Frame", "The Mass for the Dead", "From the Dead", "Uncle Abraham's Romance", "The Mystery of the Semi-Detached", "Man-Size in Marble", "Hurst of Hurstcote", "The Power of Darkness", "The Shadow", "The Head", "The Three Drugs", "In the Dark", "The New Samson", "Number 17", "The Five Senses", "The Violet Car", "The Haunted House", "The Pavilion", "From My School-Days", "In the Dark", "The Mummies at Bordeaux"
The Power of Darkness: Tales of Terror, 2006
"Man-Size in Marble", "Uncle Abraham's Romance", "From the Dead", "The Three Drugs", "The Violet Car", "John Charrington's Wedding", "The Pavilion", "Hurst of Hurstcote", "In the Dark", "The Head", "The Mystery of the Semi-detached", "The Ebony Frame", "The Five Senses", "The Shadow", "The Power of Darkness", "The Haunted Inheritance", "The Letter in Brown Ink", "The House of Silence", "The Haunted House", "The Detective"
"Women and Socialism: from the Middle-Class Point of View".Justice, 4 and 11 April 1885
"Women and Socialism: A Working Woman's Point of View".Justice, 25 April 1885
Wings and the Child, or The Building of Magic Cities, 1913
Long Ago When I Was Young[58] (originally a serial, 'My School-Days: Memories of Childhood', inGirl's Own Paper 1896–1897)[59] Originally appearing as "My School-Days: Memories of Childhood" inThe Girl's Own Paper between October 1896 and September 1897,Long Ago When I Was Young finally took book form in 1966, some 40 years after Nesbit's death, with an insightful introduction by Noel Streatfeild and some two dozen pen-and-ink drawings by Edward Ardizzone. The twelve chapters reproduce the instalments.
^Lower Kennington Lane is now the northern half of Kennington Lane, between Kennington Road and Newington Butts; the house has been demolished and there is no commemoration. Galvin, in her biography (p. 2), claims that Lower Kennington Lane is now buried deep below a main road and supermarkets. This rests on a confusion between modern Kennington Lane and its constituent former parts, Upper Kennington Lane and Lower Kennington Lane. Lower Kennington Lane still exists, though renamed and renumbered, but most of the houses of the 1850s have gone. An earlier version of theKing's Arms public house, now at 98 Kennington Lane, was numbered 44 Lower Kennington Lane. The 1861 census records Edith Nesbit at her father's Agricultural College further along the street."Find My Past 1861 Census".search.findmypast.co.uk. Retrieved29 July 2020. That site is now occupied by 20th-century public housing.
^The Book of Dragons (1901). This comprisedThe Seven Dragons, a 7-part serial, and an eighth story, all published 1899 inThe Strand Magazine, with a ninth story, "The Last of the Dragons" (posthumous, 1925). It appeared in 1972 asThe Complete Book of Dragons and in 1975 asThe Last of the Dragons and Some Others. The original title was then used, with contents augmented by "The Last of the Dragons" and material contemporary to the reissue. The titleSeven Dragons and Other Stories recurred for a latter-day Nesbit collection.[52]
^According toJohn Clute, "Most of Nesbit's supernatural fiction" contains short stories "assembled in four collections"; namely,Man and Maid and the three noted here as containing horror stories.[56]
^Bedson, S. P. (1947). "John Oliver Wentworth Bland (born 6 October 1899, died 10 May 1946)".The Journal of Pathology and Bacteriology.59 (4):716–721.doi:10.1002/path.1700590427.
^Phillippa Bennett and Rosemary Miles (2010).William Morris in the Twenty-First Century. Peter Lang.ISBN3034301065. p. 136.
^Iannello, Silvia (18 August 2008)."Edith Nesbit, la precorritrice della Rowling".Tvcinemateatro―i protagonisti. Silvia-iannello.blogspot.com (reprint 19 September 2011 from Zam (zam.it)). Retrieved9 August 2012.
^Ness, Mari (22 September 2011)."Adventures in Railroads: The Railway Children".Tor.com.Macmillan.[...] although news reports initially said that thatThe House by the Railway was published in 1896 – ten years beforeThe Railway Children – that turns out to be the publication start of the series that the book appeared in, not the actual book. Both were published in 1906, and then as now, books took some time to get from the typewriter into actual print.
