Maurice Henry Hewlett (1861-1923), was an English historical novelist, poet and essayist. He was born at Weybridge, the eldest son of Henry Gay Hewlett, of Shaw Hall, Addington, Kent. He was educated at the London International College, Spring Grove, Isleworth, and was called to the bar in 1891. He gave up the law after the success of Forest Lovers . From 1896 to 1901 he was Keeper of Lands, Revenues, Records and Enrolments, a government post as adviser on matters of medieval law. Hewlett married Hilda Beatrice Herbert on 3 January 1888 in St. Peter's Church, Vauxhall, where her father was the incumbent vicar. The couple had two children, a daughter, Pia, and a son, Francis, but separated in 1914. He settled at Broad Chalke, Wiltshire. His friends included Evelyn Underhill, and Ezra Pound, whom he met at the Poet's Club in London.
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Trivia
Maurice Hewlett was a friend of J. M. Barrie, who named one of the pirates in Peter Pan "Cecco" after Hewlett's son.
Works
- Earthwork Out of Tuscany (1895) travel
- The Masque of Dead Florentines (1895) verse
- Songs and Meditations (1897)
- Forest Lovers (1898) historical novel
- Pan and the Young Shepherd (1898) play
- Youngest of the Angels (1898) play
- Little Novels of Italy (1899) short stories
- Little Novels of English History
- The Life and Death of Richard Yea-and-Nay (1900) historical novel
- The New Canterbury Tales (1901)
- The Queen's Quair or The Six Years' Tragedy (1904) historical novel
- The Road in Tuscany (1904)
- Fond Adventures: Tales of the Youth of the World (1905) short stories
- The Fool Errant (1905) historical novel
- The Stooping Lady (1907) novel
- Artemision (1909) poems
- Halfway House (1908) novel
- Open Country (1909) novel
- Rest Harrow (1910) novel
- Letters to Sanchia (1910)
- The Song of Renny (1911)
- Brazenhead the Great (1911)
- Bendish (1913) novel
- The Song of the Plow (1916)
- The Village Wife’s Lament (1918) poems
- Thorgils of Treadholt (1917)
- In Green Shade (1920)
- The Light Heart (1920)
- Wiltshire Essays (1921)
- The Last Essays of Maurice Hewlett (1924)
- The Letters of Maurice Hewlett (1926) edited by Laurence Binyon
References
- Maurice Hewlett: A Sketch of His Career and Some Reviews of His Books, by James Lane Allen
- A bibliography of the first editions of books by Maurice Henry Hewlett (1861-1923) (1973) Percival Horace Muir
- This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.
This list omits some significant works. He wrote six novels based on the Icelandic Family sagas and only The Light Heart and Thorgils of Treadholt are mentioned here. There is also The Outlaw (based on Gisli's saga); A Lover's Tale (based on Kormak's saga) ; Frey and His Wife (Ogmund Dytt's tale); and Gudred the Fair (based on the Greenland sagas).
