Ethel May Dell Savage (2 August 1881 – 17 September 1939), known by her pen name, Ethel M. Dell, was a British writer of over 30 popular romance novels and several short stories from 1911 to 1939. Biography Dell was born on 2 August 1881 to a middle class family in Streatham, a suburb of London, England. Her father was a clerk in the City of London and she had an older sister and brother. Dell began to write stories while very young and many of them were published in popular magazines. Her stories were mainly romantic in nature, set in the British Raj and other old British colonial possessions. Her stories were considered by some to be overly sexual. Her cousins were known to tally the number of times she used the words passion, tremble, pant and thrill. Dell worked on The Way of an Eagle, her first novel, for several years, finally publishing it under T. Fisher Unwin after being rejected eight times by other publishers. The book was included in Unwin's First Novel Library, a series which highlighted a writer's first book. The Way of an Eagle was published in 1911 and had gone through thirty printings by 1915. In 1922, Ethel married a soldier, Lieutenant-Colonel Gerald Tahourdin Savage, who resigned his commission at his marriage, making Dell the sole support of the family. Despite unfavorable reviews from critics, she developed a strong fan base, earning from £20,000 to £30,000 a year. Her husband devoted himself to her and fiercely guarded her privacy. Dell continued writing, eventually producing about thirty novels and several volumes of short stories over the course of her life. Dell died of cancer on 17 September 1939 at age 58. Pictures of her are very rare and she was never interviewed by the press. References in literature The protagonist of George Orwell's novel Keep the Aspidistra Flying, makes several negative comments about Dell and other authors (notably Warwick Deeping), specifically mentioning The Way of an Eagle. He also refers to her in answers to The Cost of Letters (1946), a questionnaire on the subject of earning a living by writing. Noel Coward in the introduction to Three Plays writes, “There will always be a public for the Cinderella story, the same as there will always be a public for Miss Ethel M. Dell and the Girls Companion. In the world of amusement it