MARY ELIZABETH BRADDON was born in Frith Street, London, the daughter of a solicitor. In about 1840 her parents separated and she and her mother Fanny moved to St. Leonards-On-Sea for a short time, after which she spent the rest of her childhood in London. In the 1850s she took to the stage under the name of Mary Seyton, her mother accompanying her throughout as 'Mrs. Seyton.' She performed in numerous provincial towns and cities, and also acted at the Surrey Theatre, London for one season. During her career as an actress she 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 Beverley. In September of 1860 she 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. At this time she 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. 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. Her last novel, Mary (1916), was published posthumously.
Jennifer Carnell