Marie Belloc Lowndes

Marie Adelaide Elizabeth Rayner Lowndes (née Belloc; 5 August 1868 – 14 November 1947) was an English novelist, and sister of author Hilaire Belloc. Active from 1898 until her death, she had a reputation for combining exciting incidents with psychological interest in her books. Four of her works were adapted for the screen: The Chink in the Armour (1912; adapted 1922), The Lodger (1913; adapted several times), Letty Lynton (1931; adapted 1932), and The Story of Ivy (1927; adapted 1947). The Lodger was also adapted as a 1940 radio drama and a 1960 opera.

Personal life

Born in George Street, Marylebone, London, and raised in La Celle-Saint-Cloud, France, Belloc was the only daughter of French barrister Louis Belloc and English feminist Bessie Parkes. Her younger brother was Hilaire Belloc, whom she wrote of in her last work, The Young Hilaire Belloc (published posthumously in 1956).

Belloc's paternal grandfather was the French painter Jean-Hilaire Belloc, and her maternal great-great-grandfather was the theologian/philosopher Joseph Priestley. Her father died in 1872 when she and her brother were very young. Her mother spent 53 years as a widow and died in 1925.

In 1896, Belloc married Frederick Sawrey A. Lowndes (1868–1940), a journalist. They had one son and two daughters, the elder of whom married the Earl of Iddesleigh. Unlike her brother she was a strong supporter of the women's suffrage movement. In 1913 she was the President of the Women Writers' Suffrage League which included men as members. She got on with her brother but it was remembered that he lent her £350 in 1914 to pay off her debts.