George Edward Farrow (17 March 1862
/ref> – 1919) born in

Ipswich Ipswich () is a port town and borough in Suffolk, England, of which it is the county town. The town is located in East Anglia about away from the mouth of the River Orwell and the North Sea. Ipswich is both on the Great Eastern Main Line ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

, was a noted

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

children's book author of whose life little is known.

Early life

The son of George Farrow, a

cement A cement is a binder, a chemical substance used for construction that sets, hardens, and adheres to other materials to bind them together. Cement is seldom used on its own, but rather to bind sand and gravel ( aggregate) together. Cement mi ...

manufacturer in

, and his wife Emily, G.E. Farrow was educated in London and America. In 1891 he was working as a clerk to the Collector of

Inland Revenue The Inland Revenue was, until April 2005, a department of the British Government responsible for the collection of direct taxation, including income tax, national insurance contributions, capital gains tax, inheritance tax, corporation t ...

and was living at No 190 Dalston Lane in Hackney. In 1901 he was living at No 83 Sterndale Road in Hammersmith. By this time his occupation is listed as author. On both these dates his mother was living with him. He also lived for a time in

Brook Green Brook Green is an affluent London neighbourhood in the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham. It is located approximately west of Charing Cross. It is bordered by Kensington, Holland Park, Shepherd's Bush, Hammersmith and Brackenbury Vi ...

West Kensington West Kensington, formerly North End, is an area in the ancient parish of Fulham, in the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham, England, 3.4 miles (5.5 km) west of Charing Cross. It covers most of the London postal area of W14, includ ...

Books for children

During his literary career Farrow wrote more than 30 books for children. He encouraged his readers to write to him, answered their letters, and let their tastes and opinions guide his future works (rather like his American contemporary

L. Frank Baum Lyman Frank Baum (; May 15, 1856 – May 6, 1919) was an American author best known for his children's books, particularly ''The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'' and its sequels. He wrote 14 novels in the ''Oz'' series, plus 41 other novels (not includ ...

). Though he wrote adventure tales and poetry, Farrow was best known for nonsense books written in the tradition of

Lewis Carroll Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (; 27 January 1832 – 14 January 1898), better known by his pen name Lewis Carroll, was an English author, poet and mathematician. His most notable works are '' Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' (1865) and its sequ ...

's ''

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' (commonly ''Alice in Wonderland'') is an 1865 English novel by Lewis Carroll. It details the story of a young girl named Alice who falls through a rabbit hole into a fantasy world of anthropomorphic creature ...

'', especially his ''Wallypug'' series, including: *'' The Wallypug of Why'' (1895) *''Adventures in Wallypugland'' (1898) *''The Wallypug in London'' (1898) *''In Search of the Wallypug'' (1903) *''The Wallypug in Fogland'' (1904) *''The Wallypug in the Moon'' (1905) He wrote 34 volumes in all, his last being ''The Mysterious Shin Shira'' (1915).

Sparse facts on life

Surprisingly for a popular and prolific author, little is known of Farrow's life. A few sparse facts can be gleaned from prefaces to his books: that he owned an armchair called Pendennis, had a dog called Gip, and was known to his friends as "Gef". It can be inferred, perhaps, from the prefaces, in which he repeatedly begged for readers' letters, that he was lonely and childless. The frequency with which he changed publishers points to dissatisfaction with the terms they offered. Until recently, even the year of his birth was not known for certain,Discovered by researcher Glenn Christodoulou. it having been estimated at 1866, partly based on a reference in the Preface to an 1898 book: :One of my correspondents, aged eight, has embarrassed me very much indeed by suggesting that I should "wait for her till she grows up," as she should "so like to marry a gentleman who told stories." I hope she didn't mean that I did anything so disgraceful; and besides, as it would take nearly twenty-five years for her to catch up to me, she ''might'' change her mind in that time, and then what would become of me? What ''did'' become of Farrow is also obscure. Author

Noel Streatfeild Mary Noel Streatfeild Order of the British Empire, OBE (24 December 1895 –11 September 1986) was an English author, best known for children's books including the "Shoes" books, which were not a series (though some books made references to ...

has speculated: :I think he must have met a

Snark Snark may refer to: Fictional creatures * Snark (Lewis Carroll), a fictional animal species in Lewis Carroll's ''The Hunting of the Snark'' (1876) * Zn'rx, a race of fictional aliens in Marvel Comics publications, commonly referred to as "Snark ...

who turned out to be a Boojum, for he certainly has "softly and suddenly vanished away."Noel Streatfeild, ed., ''To the Land of Fair Delight'', London, Gollancz, 1960; Introduction, p. 7. Farrow's other books include ''The Missing Prince'' (1896) and ''The Little Panjandrum's Dodo'' (1899).

References

Notes References

External links

Works by George Edward Farrow
a
Baldwin Library of Historical Children's Literature
* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Farrow, G. E. 1862 births 1919 deaths English children's writers Writers from Ipswich