Margaret Marshall Saunders CBE (April 13, 1861 – February 15, 1947) was a prolific Canadian writer of children's stories and romance novels, a lecturer, and an animal welfare advocate. She was an active member of the Local Council of Women of Halifax.
Early life
Saunders was born April 13, 1861, in the village of Milton, Nova Scotia, one of four children born to Reverend Edmund M. and Maria (née Freeman) Saunders. She spent most of her childhood in Berwick, Nova Scotia, where her father was a Baptist minister. She studied in Edinburgh, Scotland, and Orleans, France, at the age of 15, before returning to Halifax, where she took courses at Dalhousie for a year prior to launching her career a freelance writer. It was in response to the male dominated nature of the publishing industry that she shortened her name to Marshall Saunders.
Career
Saunders an advocate of animal welfare is most famous for her novel Beautiful Joe. It tells the true story of a dog from Meaford, Ontario, that had his ears and tail chopped off by an abusive owner as a puppy, but is rescued by a Meaford family whose lives he later saves. The story is written from the dog's point of view, and is often compared to Black Beauty which was released a few years earlier.
In 1889, Saunders submitted Beautiful Joe to the American Humane Education Society Prize Competition "Kind and Cruel Treatment of Domestic Animals and Birds in the Northern States", and won a prize of $200. When the book was brought to publication in 1893, both the book and its subject received worldwide attention. It was the first Canadian book to sell over a million copies, and by the late 1930s had sold over seven million copies worldwide. It was also translated into many languages, including Esperanto.
