Edith Penelope Mary Lutyens (

pseudonym A pseudonym (; ) or alias () is a fictitious name that a person or group assumes for a particular purpose, which differs from their original or true name ( orthonym). This also differs from a new name that entirely or legally replaces an individu ...

''Esther Wyndham''; 31 July 1908 – 9 April 1999) was a British author who is principally known for her biographical works on the philosopher

Jiddu Krishnamurti Jiddu Krishnamurti (; 11 May 1895 – 17 February 1986) was a philosopher, speaker and writer. In his early life, he was groomed to be the new World Teacher, an advanced spiritual position in the theosophical tradition, but later rejected th ...

Early life

Mary Lutyens was born in London, the fourth and youngest daughter of the architect

Edwin Lutyens Sir Edwin Landseer Lutyens ( ; 29 March 1869 – 1 January 1944) was an English architect known for imaginatively adapting traditional architectural styles to the requirements of his era. He designed many English country houses, war memor ...

, and his wife,

Emily Emily may refer to: * Emily (given name), including a list of people with the name Music * "Emily" (1964 song), title song by Johnny Mandel and Johnny Mercer to the film ''The Americanization of Emily'' * "Emily" (Dave Koz song), a 1990 song ...

, the daughter of

Robert Bulwer-Lytton Edward Robert Lytton Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Earl of Lytton, (8 November 183124 November 1891) was an English statesman, Conservative politician and poet who used the pseudonym Owen Meredith. He served as Viceroy of India between 1876 and 1880duri ...

Viceroy of India The Governor-General of India (1773–1950, from 1858 to 1947 the Viceroy and Governor-General of India, commonly shortened to Viceroy of India) was the representative of the monarch of the United Kingdom and after Indian independence in 19 ...

, and the granddaughter of the writer and politician

Edward Bulwer-Lytton Edward George Earle Lytton Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton, PC (25 May 180318 January 1873) was an English writer and politician. He served as a Whig member of Parliament from 1831 to 1841 and a Conservative from 1851 to 1866. He was Secre ...

. Mary was the younger sister of the composer

Elisabeth Lutyens Agnes Elisabeth Lutyens, CBE (9 July 190614 April 1983) was an English composer. Early life and education Elisabeth Lutyens was born in London on 9 July 1906. She was one of the five children of Lady Emily Bulwer-Lytton (1874–1964), a me ...

. As a child, Lutyens spent time with her maternal grandmother

Edith Edith is a feminine given name derived from the Old English words ēad, meaning 'riches or blessed', and is in common usage in this form in English, German, many Scandinavian languages and Dutch. Its French form is Édith. Contractions and var ...

, the former vicereine, who lived at

Knebworth Knebworth is a village and civil parish in the north of Hertfordshire, England, immediately south of Stevenage. The civil parish covers an area between the villages of Datchworth, Woolmer Green, Codicote, Kimpton, Whitwell, St Paul's Walden ...

, thirty miles from London, with her daughter the suffragette Constance Bulwer-Lytton. Edwin Lutyens had designed a

dower house A dower house is usually a moderately large house available for use by the widow of the previous owner of an English, Scottish or Welsh estate. The widow, often known as the "dowager", usually moves into the dower house from the larger family h ...

for his mother-in-law called Homewood. As a result of her mother's interest in

theosophy Theosophy is a religion established in the United States during the late 19th century. It was founded primarily by the Russian Helena Blavatsky and draws its teachings predominantly from Blavatsky's writings. Categorized by scholars of religion a ...

,Lutyens, (Edith Penelope)
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Subscription or membership of a UK public library required. Lutyens met Krishnamurti when she was a child: she knew him from 1911 until his death in 1986. In the 1920s, her father was working on his buildings at Delhi. Lutyens visited India with her mother and went to Australia, staying at The Manor, a centre run by

Charles Webster Leadbeater Charles Webster Leadbeater (; 16 February 1854 – 1 March 1934) was a member of the Theosophical Society, Co-Freemasonry, author on occult subjects and co-initiator with J. I. Wedgwood of the Liberal Catholic Church. Originally a p ...

Mosman, New South Wales Mosman is a suburb on the Lower North Shore region of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Mosman is located 8 kilometres north-east of the Sydney central business district and is the administrative centre for the local gover ...

, while Krishnamurti and his brother Nitya stayed at another house nearby. Lutyens stayed there for some time, which eventually provided her with material for her book ''Krishnamurti: The Years of Awakening''.

Career

Apart from her works on Krishnamurti, Lutyens wrote biographies of

John Ruskin John Ruskin (8 February 1819 20 January 1900) was an English writer, philosopher, art critic and polymath of the Victorian era. He wrote on subjects as varied as geology, architecture, myth, ornithology, literature, education, botany and pol ...

Effie Gray Euphemia Chalmers Millais, Lady Millais (''née'' Gray; 7 May 1828 – 23 December 1897) was a Scottish artists' model and the wife of Pre-Raphaelite painter John Everett Millais. She had previously been married to the art critic John Ruskin ...

and her own family. In her book ''Millais and the Ruskins'' she put forward the controversial argument that Ruskin could not consummate his marriage because he was repelled by his wife's pubic hair. She wrote novels under the pseudonym "Esther Wyndham" for the

Mills & Boon Mills & Boon is a romance imprint of British publisher Harlequin UK Ltd. It was founded in 1908 by Gerald Rusgrove Mills and Charles Boon as a general publisher. The company moved towards escapist fiction for women in the 1930s. In 1971, the ...

and

Harlequin Romance Harlequin Enterprises ULC (known simply as Harlequin) is a romance and women's fiction publisher founded in Winnipeg, Canada in 1949. From the 1960s, it grew into the largest publisher of romance fiction in the world. Based in Toronto, Canada si ...

imprints.

Personal life

Lutyens married twice. Her first marriage, in 1930, to Anthony Rupert Herbert Franklin Sewell, a stockbroker, produced one daughter, Amanda Lutyens Sewell, but ended in divorce in 1945. Her second marriage, in 1945, was to Joseph Gluckstein Links, art historian and royal furrier, and ended with his death in 1997.

Works

*'' Perchance to Dream'', London: John Murray, 1935. *''To be young : some chapters of autobiography'', London: R. Hart-Davies, 1959 , 1989 edition: *''Effie in Venice: Effie Ruskin's Letters Home 1849–1852'', London: John Murray, 1965, Pallas Athene (UK), 2001 edition: . *''Millais and the Ruskins'', London: John Murray, 1967,

Vanguard Press The Vanguard Press (1926–1988) was a United States publishing house established with a $100,000 grant from the left wing American Fund for Public Service, better known as the Garland Fund. Throughout the 1920s, Vanguard Press issued an array of ...

in USA. *''Krishnamurti: The Years of Awakening'', London: John Murray, 1975,

Shambhala Publications Shambhala Publications is an independent publishing company based in Boulder, Colorado. According to the company, it specializes in "books that present creative and conscious ways of transforming the individual, the society, and the planet". Man ...

reprint edition 1997: . First installment of a three-volume biography, covers the period from Krishnamurti's birth in 1895 to 1933. *''Krishnamurti: The Years of Fulfilment'', London: John Murray, 1983, ,

Farrar, Straus, Giroux Farrar, Straus and Giroux (FSG) is an American book publishing company, founded in 1946 by Roger Williams Straus Jr. and John C. Farrar. FSG is known for publishing literary books, and its authors have won numerous awards, including Pulitze ...

paperback: , Avon Books 1991 reprint with US spelling "Fulfillment": . Second volume of the Krishnamurti biography, covers the years from 1933 to 1980. *''Krishnamurti: The Open Door'', London: John Murray, 1988, . Final volume of biography covers years 1980 to 1986, the end of Krishnamurti's life. *''The Lyttons in India: An account of Lord Lytton's Viceroyalty, 1876–1880'' London: John Murray, 1979, . *''Edwin Lutyens: A Memoir'', Academic Pr Canada Ltd, 1980, ,

Black Swan The black swan (''Cygnus atratus'') is a large waterbird, a species of swan which breeds mainly in the southeast and southwest regions of Australia. Within Australia, the black swan is nomadic, with erratic migration patterns dependent upon ...

, 1991 revised edition: . *''The Life and Death of Krishnamurti'', London: John Murray, 1990, , Nesma Books India 1999: , , also published as ''Krishnamurti: His Life and Death'',

St Martins Press St. Martin's Press is a book publisher headquartered in Manhattan, New York City, in the Equitable Building. St. Martin's Press is considered one of the largest English-language publishers, bringing to the public some 700 titles a year under si ...

1991: , an abridgement of her trilogy on Krishnamurti's life. *''The Boy Krishna'', 1995, Krishnamurti Foundation Trust paperback: . Subtitled, "The First Fourteen Years in the Life of J. Krishnamurti". *''Krishnamurti and the Rajagopals'', 1996,

Ojai, CA Ojai ( ; Chumash: ''’Awhaỳ'') is a city in Ventura County, California. Located in the Ojai Valley, it is northwest of Los Angeles and east of Santa Barbara. The valley is part of the east–west trending Western Transverse Ranges and ...

: Krishnamurti Foundation of America, . *''J. Krishnamurti: A Life'', 2005, Penguin Books India, . This book is a compilation of ''The Years of Awakening'', ''The Years of Fulfilment'', and ''The Open Door''.

References

Sources

* Sarah Anderson
Obituary: Mary Lutyens
''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publish ...

'', 13 April 1999. * Eric Page
Obituary: Mary Lutyens, English Editor, Novelist and Biographer, 90
''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'', 17 April 1999. {{DEFAULTSORT:Lutyens, Mary 1908 births 1999 deaths Theosophy English biographers 20th-century biographers Pseudonymous women writers Women romantic fiction writers Lutyens family 20th-century pseudonymous writers