Mabel E. Wotton
English writer
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Mabel Elizabeth Emily Wotton (1863–1927) was an English writer.[1]
Life
Mabel E. Wotton was born in London to Frances Emily and John Stirling Wilmot Wotton, a civil servant.[1][2] (Note that her Times death notice gives her father's name as Henry Stirling Wotton.[3]) Her older brother Thomas wrote plays, and her younger sister Edith was a publisher's reader.[1]
In 1895, through the actress Irene Vanbrugh, Wotton met Israel Zangwill. Zangwill introduced Wotton's work to the publisher John Lane, who accepted Day-Books for his controversial Keynotes series.[4] Wotton and Zangwill kept up a friendship and correspondence until at least 1920.[5] Zangwill based the character Margaret Engelborne in The Mantle of Elijah on Wotton.[4] Her correspondence with Zangwill shows her connections to London's literary world. She knew George Egerton and Dion Boucicault, and dedicated her story collection Day-Books to Alice Meynell in "gratitute for tenderness".[6] She never married.[2]
Wotton is best known for her New Woman fiction.[2][7] As well as her adult novels and short stories, Wotton wrote several books for children. She also contributed non-fiction to the Cornhill Magazine, and wrote an appreciation of the actor H. B. Irving.
She died in London on 3 March 1927.[3]
Works
- Word Portraits of Famous Writers. London: Richard Bentley & Son, 1887. Edited by Wotton.
- A Pretty Radical and Other Stories. London: D. Stott, 1890.
- A Girl Diplomatist. London: Chapman and Hall, 1892.
- A Nursery Idyll. London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1892.
- A Mannerless Monkey. London: A. D. Innes & Co., 1893. Illustrated by Edith Ellison.
- Day-Books. London: John Lane, 1896.
- On Music's Wings. London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1898.
- The Little Browns. London : Blackie & Son, Ltd., 1900. Illustrated by H. M. Brock.
- H. B. Irving: An Appreciation. London: Cassell, 1911.