maryelizabethbraddon

MARY ELIZABETH BRADDON (1835-1915), the author of approximately ninety books written between 1860 and 1915, was one of the most popular and prolific novelists of her age. As well as being an editor of two magazines, Belgravia and the Christmas annual Mistletoe Bough, her vast output also included poetry, plays and essays. In the 1860s she was one of the most successful and controversial novelists of her generation, rated alongside Wilkie Collins (she cited him as her 'literary father') as a pioneer of the sensation genre. These novels were characterised by mystery, strong passions and opinions, and intricate plotting. After the publication of the two novels which made her famous, Lady Audley's Secret (1862) and Aurora Floyd (1863), Braddon was criticised as a purveyor of immoral fiction.

Novel after novel flowed from her pen, often at the rate of two per year. Braddon also wrote novels influenced by French realism, working class fiction, detective novels (her contribution to the development of detective fiction is an important one), historical novels and 'straight' novels. Her use of, and contribution to, popular culture over many decades provides an excellent insight into the development of genre fiction.

Braddon was born in 1835 at 2 Frith Street, Soho, London, the daughter of a Cornish solicitor and an Irish mother. In about 1840 her parents separated after Mrs. Braddon discovered her husband had been having an affair, and Braddon and her mother Fanny moved to St. Leonards-On-Sea in East Sussex for a short time, after which she spent the rest of her childhood in London, finally settling in Camberwell.

Despite the separation of her parents, Braddon's childhood years were not unlike that of other middle class girls without ample means. Yet far from waiting to get married, Braddon's path was to be very different. Tall with curly auburn hair, and later described as having a very fine speaking voice, she decided upon the then shocking career of actress.

In the early 1850s she took to the stage under the name of Mary Seyton, her mother accompanying her throughout as 'Mrs. Seyton.' During her theatrical career she performed with several companies in numerous provincial towns and cities in England and Scotland, and also acted at the Surrey Theatre, London for one season.

While pursing her career as an actress, Braddon wrote poetry and plays in her spare time, and it was during these years that her first works were published. She left the stage in February 1860 to become a full time writer and her first novel, Three Times Dead, was published by a local publisher in Yorkshire.

In September of 1860 Braddon moved to London, and the following year the novels which were to make her famous, Lady Audley's Secret and Aurora Floyd, began to be serialised in two magazines belonging to the publisher John Maxwell (1824-1895). Braddon also wrote a number of anonymous novels for lower class journals, of which The Black Band; or, The Mysteries of Midnight (1861-1862) is the most well known.

Shortly after meeting him, she controversially set up home with her publisher, becoming stepmother to his six children, and having six children of her own. Maxwell was separated from his first wife, due to her mental instability after the birth of their last child, and Braddon and Maxwell were not able to marry until after her death in 1874.

In 1866 Braddon became editor of Maxwell's magazine Belgravia, and this became the vehicle for most of her novels in the following ten years. Subsequently, many of her novels were serialised in newspapers and magazines.

Despite her scandalous past, by the 1880s Braddon was a respected literary figure. She mixed freely in high society, and she and her husband were prominent figures in the two areas in which they owned large houses, Richmond and the New Forest.

In total, Braddon was the author of ninety novels (several were unacknowledged), numerous short stories, essays and several plays. From controversial beginnings as a purveyor of immoral sensation fiction, she became a respected writer. She lived to see a silent film version of Aurora Floyd in 1913. Her last novel, Mary (1916), was published posthumously.

More can be read about Braddon in The Literary Lives of Mary Elizabeth Braddon by Jennifer Carnell.