Elizabeth and Her German Garden

Elizabeth von Arnim was an English novelist. Born in Australia she married a German aristocrat and her earliest works are set in Germany. Her first marriage made her Countess von Arnim-Schlagenthin and her second Elizabeth Russell Countess Russell. After her first husbands death she had a three-year affair with the writer H. G. Wells then later married Frank Russell elder brother of the Nobel prize-winner and philosopher Bertrand Russell. She was a cousin of the New Zealand-born writer Katherine Mansfield. Though known in early life as May her first book introduced her to readers as Elizabeth which she eventually became friends and finally to family. Her writings are ascribed to Elizabeth von Arnim. She used the pseudonym Alice Cholmondeley for only one novel Christine published in 1917.