Mary Gleed Tuttiett (11 December 1846 – 21 September 1923), better known by the

pen name A pen name, also called a ''nom de plume'' or a literary double, is a pseudonym (or, in some cases, a variant form of a real name) adopted by an author and printed on the title page or by-line of their works in place of their real name. A pen na ...

Maxwell Gray, was an English

novelist A novelist is an author or writer of novels, though often novelists also write in other genres of both fiction and non-fiction. Some novelists are professional novelists, thus make a living writing novels and other fiction, while others aspire to ...

and

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator ( thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral or writte ...

best known for her 1886 novel ''

The Silence of Dean Maitland ''The Silence of Dean Maitland'' is an 1886 novel by Maxwell Gray (the pen name of Mary Gleed Tuttiett). Set in a fictionalized Isle of Wight, particularly around Calbourne, it concerns an ambitious clergyman who accidentally kills the father o ...

''.

Life

Tuttiett was born and brought up in Newport,

Isle of Wight The Isle of Wight ( ) is a county in the English Channel, off the coast of Hampshire, from which it is separated by the Solent. It is the largest and second-most populous island of England. Referred to as 'The Island' by residents, the Isle of ...

, the daughter of the surgeon Frank Bampfylde Tuttiett and his wife Elizabeth

née A birth name is the name of a person given upon birth. The term may be applied to the surname, the given name, or the entire name. Where births are required to be officially registered, the entire name entered onto a birth certificate or birth re ...

Gleed. Largely self-educated, in early adulthood she visited

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

, various other parts of England, and

Yverdon-les-Bains Yverdon-les-Bains () (called Eburodunum and Ebredunum during the Roman era) is a municipality in the district of Jura-Nord vaudois of the canton of Vaud in Switzerland. It is the seat of the district. The population of Yverdon-les-Bains, , wa ...

in Switzerland;Maxwell Gray,

Catherine Jane Hamilton Catherine Jane Hamilton (1841–1935) was an author and journalist who also wrote under the pen name, Retlaw Spring. Life She was born to a family with Irish roots in Somerset, second daughter of Richard Hamilton (1805/6–1859), vicar of Kilme ...

, 1894, ''The Woman at Home'', Warwick Magazine Co but for the majority of her working life as a writer suffered constant debilitating illness from asthma and rheumatism—reports described her as "a confirmed invalid"—that left her unable to leave her bed for more than two to three hours a day. She wrote lying on a sofa.''Book News'', National Book League, 134, vol 12, October 1893 For much of her life she lived and worked confined to her home in Newport, first at Pyle Street (where works up to ''The Last Sentence'' were written) then at Castle Road, only making occasional trips out by carriage or bath-chair. On one such trip she visited the American writer

Wolcott Balestier Charles Wolcott Balestier (December 13, 1861 – December 6, 1891) was a promising American writer, editor, and publisher who died young, and is now remembered primarily for his connection to Rudyard Kipling. His sister Carrie Balestier married ...

, whose sister married

Rudyard Kipling Joseph Rudyard Kipling ( ; 30 December 1865 – 18 January 1936)''The Times'', (London) 18 January 1936, p. 12. was an English novelist, short-story writer, poet, and journalist. He was born in British India, which inspired much of his work. ...

, when he and his family were staying at

Blackgang Blackgang is a village on the south-western coast of the Isle of Wight. It is best known as the location of the Blackgang Chine amusement park which sits to the south of St Catherine's Down. Blackgang forms the west end of the Ventnor Undercli ...

. Her 1893 novel ''The Last Sentence'' was dedicated to Balestier after his early death. She was strongly interested in women's rights, being one of a number of writers who petitioned in support of the Women's Suffrage Bill, and such themes appear in a number of her novels.''The Stanford Companion to Victorian Fiction'', John Sutherland, Stanford University Press, 1990 After her father's death in 1895, she moved to West Richmond, remaining in London until her death in 1923, aged 76, at

Ealing Ealing () is a district in West London, England, west of Charing Cross in the London Borough of Ealing. Ealing is the administrative centre of the borough and is identified as a major metropolitan centre in the London Plan. Ealing was histor ...

.Obituary, ''The Times'', 22 September 1923

Works

Mary Tuttiett began her literary career by contributing essays, poems, articles, and short stories to various periodicals
The World's Greatest Books
', Volume V., Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds., Internet Archive including ''

Atalanta Atalanta (; grc-gre, Ἀταλάντη, Atalantē) meaning "equal in weight", is a heroine in Greek mythology. There are two versions of the huntress Atalanta: one from Arcadia, whose parents were Iasus and Clymene and who is primarily known ...

''. Her first novel, ''The Broken Tryst'', was published in 1879 to lukewarm reviews, but Tuttiett achieved critical and popular success with the 1886 ''

'' ("a powerful and impressive story, which was appreciated both by critics and by the public"). This tells the story of a churchman who gets a young woman pregnant and kills her father in a fight, then allows the wrongful imprisonment of his friend for the manslaughter. On the eve of his accession to bishop, he is forced to face his guilt when that friend returns, released from prison on

ticket of leave A ticket of leave was a document of parole issued to convicts who had shown they could now be trusted with some freedoms. Originally the ticket was issued in Britain and later adapted by the United States, Canada, and Ireland. Jurisdictions ...

. The reader for the publisher

Kegan Paul Charles Kegan Paul (8 March 1828 – 19 July 1902) was an English clergyman, publisher and author. He began his adult life as a clergyman of the Church of England, and served the Church for more than 20 years. His religious orientation moved fr ...

, Alfred Chenevix Trench, initially thought ''The Silence of Dean Maitland'' "a little too unorthodox" for his religious clientele, but on the second reading decided it was "too good to refuse". The release saw a deal of speculation about the authorship, including theories that it has been written by a well-known ecclesiastic or the daughter of the Archbishop of Canterbury. The poet

Tennyson Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson (6 August 1809 – 6 October 1892) was an English poet. He was the Poet Laureate during much of Queen Victoria's reign. In 1829, Tennyson was awarded the Chancellor's Gold Medal at Cambridge for one of his ...

praised the book, driving to Newport to meet Miss Tuttiett as her illness prevented her visiting him at his winter home near

Freshwater Fresh water or freshwater is any naturally occurring liquid or frozen water containing low concentrations of dissolved salts and other total dissolved solids. Although the term specifically excludes seawater and brackish water, it does include ...

. ''The Silence of Dean Maitland'' and a number of Mary Tuttiett's other novels are set in a fictionalised Isle of Wight, in which Newport,

Calbourne Calbourne is a village in the civil parish of Calbourne, Newtown and Porchfield, on the Isle of Wight, England. It is located 5 miles (8 km) from Newport in the west of the island. The village takes its name from the stream that passes thr ...

, Swainstone, Brading and

Arreton Arreton is a village and civil parish in the central eastern part of the Isle of Wight, England. It is about 3 miles south east of Newport. Name The settlement has had different names and different spellings over the years. For example, the vi ...

appear as "Oldport", "Malbourne", "Swaynestone", "Barling" and "Arden". She also wrote a number of poetry anthologies. In 1910,

Arthur Mee Arthur Henry Mee (21 July 187527 May 1943) was an English writer, journalist and educator. He is best known for ''The Harmsworth Self-Educator'', '' The Children's Encyclopædia'', ''The Children's Newspaper'', and ''The King's England''. The ...

and J.A. Hammerton's ''The World's Greatest Books'' said of ''The Silence of Dean Maitland'' that it had immediately and permanently established her name in the front rank of living novelists. The obituary in ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (fou ...

'' described her works overall as "characterised by a delicate grace and charm, and generally suggested a serious purpose, but she can never be said to have equalled her first success". ''The Silence of Dean Maitland'' became a successful stage play, and was filmed three times: in 1914 by

Raymond Longford Raymond Longford (born John Walter Hollis Longford, 23 September 18782 April 1959) was a prolific Australian film director, writer, producer and actor during the silent era. Longford was a major director of the silent film era of the Australian ...

, in 1915 (under the title ''Sealed Lips'') by John Ince, and in 1934 in Australia by

Ken G. Hall Kenneth George Hall, AO, OBE (22 February 1901 – 8 February 1994), better known as Ken G. Hall, was an Australian film producer and director, considered one of the most important figures in the history of the Australian film industry. ...

. ''The Reproach of Annesley'' was filmed in 1915, and ''The Last Sentence'' in 1917.

Bibliography

*''The Broken Tryst'' (1879): concerning a young woman torn between love for a miller's son serving in India and for the colonel of his regiment. *''

'' (1886): concerning an ambitious churchman who kills a man and lets his best friend be wrongfully imprisoned for the crime *''Reproach of Annesley'' (serialised 1888–89, book 1889): a romance between an heiress and a young officer is blighted by the suspicion that he may have killed a rival for her affections. *''Westminster chimes and other poems'' (1890) *''In the Heart of the Storm'' (1891): an army officer is torn between his childhood sweetheart and a woman he meets while serving in India during the

Siege of Lucknow The siege of Lucknow was the prolonged defence of the British Residency within the city of Lucknow from rebel sepoys (Indian soldiers in the British East India Company's Army) during the Indian Rebellion of 1857. After two successive relief att ...

*''An Innocent Impostor'' (1892): a short story collection, leading with a comedy of mistaken identity *''The Last Sentence'' (1894): in which a judge, who has concealed for years his disastrous first marriage, finds himself in the position of sentencing his daughter to death for child murder *''A Costly Freak'' (1894): concerning the complications that arise when a naive and impoverished curate finds a large sum of money in his Bible, and believes it to be put there by divine intervention. *''Lays of the Dragon Slayer'' (1894): poetry, a retelling of the ''

Nibelunglied The ( gmh, Der Nibelunge liet or ), translated as ''The Song of the Nibelungs'', is an epic poem written around 1200 in Middle High German. Its anonymous poet was likely from the region of Passau. The is based on an oral tradition of Germanic ...

''. *''Sweethearts and Friends'' (1897): a romance between a suffragette medical student and an otherwise perfect but sexist politician. *''Ribstone Pippins: A Country Tale'' (1898): a young carter's plans to marry his sweetheart are dashed by the story that she has eloped with another man. *''The House of Hidden Treasure'' (1899): a

family saga The family saga is a genre of literature which chronicles the lives and doings of a family or a number of related or interconnected families over a period of time. In novels (or sometimes sequences of novels) with a serious intent, this is often ...

about a woman from a well-to-do family who is cheated, by misfortune and malice, of her inheritance and chances of love. *''The Forest Chapel and Other Poems'' (1899) *''The World's Mercy'' (1899): short story collection, leading with a tragedy about the redemption of an alcoholic doctor. *''Four-leaved Clover'' (1901): the saga of a romance between an honour-bound army officer and the young woman who fell in love with him at a ball. *''Richard Rosny'' (1903): a family saga about the life and unhappy marriage of a naval officer forced to give up his promising career after a family tragedy. *''The Great Refusal'' (1906): concerning a young man who becomes disaffected with the practices of his wealthy father's business; is disinherited and forced to earn a living in London while testing his social theories; and finally becomes leader of a group of social reformers, the Brotherhood of the Golden Rule, who emigrate to East Africa. *''The Suspicions of Ermengarde'' (1908): a young married woman on a convalescent holiday in the south of France finds she is being shadowed by a mysterious stranger. *''England's Son and Other Poems'' (1910) *''Unconfessed'' (1911): a rich landowner's life unravels on the revelation that he may have implicated his younger brother in a crime. *''Something Afar'' (US title ''The Desire of the Moth'' - "a Romance of the Italian Lakes"): a retired middle-aged bank clerk finds a message that leads him to Italy to seek the truth behind his betrayal decades earlier by the young countess he loved. *''The World Mender'' (1916): the story of a politician's rise from working-class roots, until his career is blighted by a romance with an unscrupulous womanLatest Works of Fiction; "The World Mender", by Maxwell Gray, ''The New York Times'', 2 July 191
NYT Archive
/ref> *''The Diamond Pendant'' (1918): a popular governess, in thrall to a blackmailer, becomes a jewel thief. *''A Bit of Blue Stone, and other stories'' (1923), The title story is a romance between a convalescent soldier and a VAD nurse set in

Bournemouth Bournemouth () is a coastal resort town in the Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole council area of Dorset, England. At the 2011 census, the town had a population of 183,491, making it the largest town in Dorset. It is situated on the Southern ...

during World War One. The anthology also includes ''After the Crash'', an SF story set in a post-apocalyptic London.

References

External links

*
''A Wren-like Note''
free biography of Maxwell Gray by Ray Girvan {{DEFAULTSORT:Gray, Maxwell 1846 births 1923 deaths English women novelists English essayists English women poets Pseudonymous women writers British women essayists English short story writers British women short story writers 19th-century English novelists 19th-century English poets 19th-century English women writers 20th-century English novelists 20th-century English women writers People from Newport, Isle of Wight 19th-century British short story writers 20th-century British short story writers 19th-century essayists 20th-century essayists English women non-fiction writers 19th-century pseudonymous writers 20th-century pseudonymous writers