Ella Fuller Maitland (née Ella Sophia Mary Chester; 8 January 1857 – 15 November 1939) was a British novelist and poet, who had considerable success as a writer in the 1890s.

Life

Ella Sophia Mary Chester was born in London on 8 January 1857, the daughter of

Harry Chester Harry Chester (1 October 1806 – 5 October 1868) was a British civil servant who spent most of his career in the Privy Council Office (United Kingdom), Privy Council Office. He published one book, ''The Lay of the Lady Ellen, a tale of 1834'', an ...

, a civil servant and the founder of the

Highgate Literary and Scientific Institution The Highgate Literary and Scientific Institution (HLSI) is a Charitable Company ( CIO) Limited by Guarantee. It was founded in 1839 in Highgate, North London, as a friendly society with the aim of helping local people to better understand new d ...

. She married Robert Fuller-Maitland, and the couple lived in Sidmouth, Devon. She was a member of the Royal Society for the Protection of Animals, and a number of other animal charities. Maitland published ''Pages from the Day-book of Bethia Hardacre'' in 1895, encouraged by

Frederick Greenwood Frederick Greenwood (25 March 1830 – 14 December 1909) was an English journalist, editor, and man of letters. He completed Elizabeth Gaskell's novel '' Wives and Daughters'' after her death in 1865. Early years Born in Kensington, London, h ...

. ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British Newspaper#Daily, daily Newspaper#National, national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its modern name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its si ...

'' wrote:

It is easier to say what Bethia Hardacre is not than what it is. It is not a novel, because there is no story; we do not say there are no characters. It is not a "commonplace book," because there is nothing commonplace about it; on the contrary, it is strikingly original. Nor is it, as might be assumed from the antiquated Christian name Bethia, a réchauffé of the too familiar, imaginary reminiscences of the Elizabethan period or the Civil Wars. Nor can the book be commended in the ordinary fashion. No higher praise can be bestowed on the sensational or shocking novel of the times than that when you take it up it is impossible to lay it down. But we are always laying down "Bethia Hardacre" as it lulls us into pleasant day-dreams or tempts us to speculative reverie... It mirrors the mind of a cultured woman, with a pure and sensitive poetical taste... There are touches of deep pathos with a genial cynicism which is sensibly sharpened by its evident truth.

1899's ''The Etchingham Letters,'' written with Sir Frederick Pollock, was an

epistolary novel An epistolary novel () is a novel written as a series of letters between the fictional characters of a narrative. The term is often extended to cover novels that intersperse other kinds of fictional document with the letters, most commonly di ...

. Godfrey Frank Singer wrote that:

in ''The Etchingham Letters'' (1899), we find a literary correspondence which... is a collaboration. The authors are Sir Frederick Pollock and Ella Fuller Maitland. The two do not seem to have made any obvious division of labor, but to have written together in all the letters regardless of the pretended writer. There is a definite eighteenth-century tone to this book.

Death

Ella Fuller Maitland died on 15 November 1939. In her will, she left £500 to the

National Trust The National Trust () is a heritage and nature conservation charity and membership organisation in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. The Trust was founded in 1895 by Octavia Hill, Sir Robert Hunter and Hardwicke Rawnsley to "promote the ...

; £300 to the

RSPCA The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) is a charity operating in England and Wales which promotes animal welfare. The RSPCA is funded primarily by voluntary donations. Founded in 1824, it is the oldest and largest a ...

; £300 to the

Men of the Trees International Tree Foundation (ITF) is an international, non-profit, non-political, conservation organisation. It is involved in planting, maintenance and protection of trees. It was founded in Kenya on 22 July 1922 by Richard St. Barbe Baker as ...

: £209 to Our Dumb Friends League; £200 to the

Royal Society for the Protection of Birds The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) is a Charitable_organization#United_Kingdom, charitable organisation registered in Charity Commission for England and Wales, England and Wales and in Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator, ...

; and £200 to the

Council for the Preservation of Rural England CPRE, The Countryside Charity, formerly known by names such as the ''Council for the Preservation of Rural England'' and the ''Campaign to Protect Rural England'', is a charity in England with over 40,000 members and supporters. Formed in 1926 ...

Works

* ''Parva'' oems(1886) * ''Verse: rustic and elegiac'' (1890) * ''Pages from the Day-book of Bethia Hardacre'' (1895) * ''The Saltonstall Gazette'' (1896) * ''The Song-book of Bethia Hardacre'' (1897) * * ''Blanche Esmead: a Story of Diverse Temperaments'' (1906) * ''More Pages from the Day-book of Bethia Hardacre'' (1907) * ''By Land and Water'' (1911) * ''The Clere Family: 1927-1928'' with R. Spence Bernard (1929)

References

External links

Works by Ella Fuller Maitland
at the

Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American 501(c)(3) organization, non-profit organization founded in 1996 by Brewster Kahle that runs a digital library website, archive.org. It provides free access to collections of digitized media including web ...

Ella Fuller Maitland
at

WorldCat WorldCat is a union catalog that itemizes the collections of tens of thousands of institutions (mostly libraries), in many countries, that are current or past members of the OCLC global cooperative. It is operated by OCLC, Inc. Many of the O ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Fuller Maitland, Ella 1857 births 1939 deaths 19th-century British women writers 20th-century British women writers Novelists from London Poets from London